


A Life Avenged

by KillCode311



Series: Project Perdition [2]
Category: Five nights at Freddy’s - Fandom
Genre: Bullying, Despair, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hanging Trigger Warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-14
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:00:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 33
Words: 39,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24184777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KillCode311/pseuds/KillCode311
Summary: Jeremy Fitzgerald is struggling to find a job in a new town when he happens upon Freddy Fazbear Pizza and Arcade. He’s hired practically on the spot and soon discovers that his new job is slightly more hazardous than he expected. A strange encounter with one of the animatronics leads him to believe that, there may be a bit more to the robotic entertainer than he thought.
Series: Project Perdition [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1604095
Comments: 13
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter 1

**Prolouge**

  
Jeremy breathed heavily through the heavy mask on his head, his own hot breath made his face feel uncomfortably damp. He tried to look through the eyeholes of the mask but they were infuriatingly too low for him to see anything but the floor of his hiding spot. He heard the faint, quick jingle of that pale-faced freak show coming steadily closer. Jeremy shivered and gripped the flashlight in his hand. He heard a scratching noise just to his left, in the direction of the door. Jeremy lifted the mask just enough to peer from underneath the table. He saw the black and white striped legs dragging along the floor, not even supporting the abomination above them. ‘How does it just float like that?’ Jeremy thought stunned. It paused right next to the table he was under, he held his breath and watched its knees slowly bend despite them not holding any weight, despite the supernatural puppet being able to float through the air. Jeremy prepared himself to kick out, but before he could, something grabbed him from behind, and yanked him out screaming from under the table.

_A Life Avenged_

  
Jeremy Fitzgerald casually watched the kids run around the playground screaming. About an hour earlier, his mom had ordered him to take his little sister to her favorite playground for the last time. In just about 15 hours, early tomorrow morning, they would leave their hometown to move to some other backwater town. She was spending time at home fixing and cleaning up the house as much as she could.  
“We’re lucky to be able to sell a house this old.” She had said. Jeremy didn’t feel lucky, he was leaving behind his friends, his junior high school crush, basically everybody he knew that wasn’t his family. He felt incredibly unlucky, the man who was helping pay rent for their house had died and his mom just couldn’t keep up with her two part-time jobs. They had gotten along for a month or so but they soon became swamped in bills and debt. Fortunately there was a cheap apartment building in a neighboring town that his mom would be able to pay for, with a little help. Jeremy would have to pick up the slack and get a job to help out with paying for food, gas, and other junk that his mom couldn’t. He was nervous about getting a job, he was 16 and fairly capable of doing simple tasks. But he was more interested in working on his game.

Back in junior high, one of his teachers had convinced Jeremy to start working on a video game. He was interested in a video game designer career, but fate so far was disagreeing with his dream goal. He found little time to work on it between watching his sister and doing homework. Jeremy felt like he had a good idea of what it would be about, but just couldn’t find the time to do it. His attention was quickly snapped back to reality when he heard his sister scream. He stood up quickly and scanned the playground. She was going down the slide and screaming with joy. Jeremy sighed and sat back down, his leg twitched slightly so he closed them to prevent anybody from seeing. For some reason he got a weird tic in his muscles whenever he was surprised or stressed. He hated when people saw it or mentioned it. He especially hated when the kids at school called him “twitch-wad”. It was a stupid and pathetic insult and should’ve gotten used to it by now, but something like that takes a long time to get used to. Not that he wanted to get used to it, he almost started a fight over it in school but his common sense prevailed. His mom always told him that he always thought before he did anything, which was good except for when he did something like, ask a girl out, or to admit that he did something wrong. He had a profound fear of disappointing someone so he always did the least riskiest option. He never talked or made friends with someone unless he knew that they would be nice to him. He never asked anybody out unless he knew for certain that they would say yes. Not that he’d ever asked anybody out. He didn’t know a lot of girls personally, lots of people knew him however. Jeremy looked down at his watch, it was 6:34, four minutes after him said they needed to be home. He cussed under his breath and stood up.  
“Lil! Time to go home!” He called in the general direction of the playground. He couldn’t pick her out of the crowd of kids until she came running out of them with a huge smile on her face.  
Jeremy grinned despite himself, his sister always made him smile. She jumped up into Jeremy when she got close and he almost fell over trying to catch her.  
“Whoa careful! I’m not as strong as I look.” Jeremy set her down gently and she reached up to hold his hand while they walked.  
“Lilac, you’re 8 years old, you don’t need to hold my hand.”  
“Aww please?” She looked up at him with her bright green eyes. Jeremy held eye contact with her keeping his resolve. She stared back for a few seconds before her eyes started to water. She eventually blinked and Jeremy laughed.  
“I win.”  
“It’s not fair! You’re bigger so you can hold your eyes open longer!” She started to fake pout while Jeremy ruffled her short, blonde hair.  
“You guys are weird.” Said a little boy who was standing a distance off and watching the exchange. Jeremy raised an eyebrow and looked down at Lilac, “This one one of your friends?” He asked. She nodded and waved to him as they walked away.  
“Bye Richard!” She called and blew a kiss to him. Richards eyes widened and he ran for it.  
“LILAC TRIED TO KISS ME!” He screamed as he ran.  
“You better not let mom see you do that.” Jeremy warned gently. Lilac shrugged and smiled, “Oh they know I wouldn’t do that. Richards gross, he picked his nose once.” She made a grossed out face, then changed it to a thoughtful one.  
“But he also gave me a flower once.”  
“You shouldn’t be thinking about boys this early in your life.” Jeremy said.  
“You should be thinking about girls that late in your life. But where are they?” She said innocently. Jeremy glared down at her, “You don’t need to worry about that.” Lilac shrugged and smiled. Jeremy elbowed her arm and she elbowed him back.  
“You hit me first.” She said.  
“I was born first.”  
“First is the worst.”  
“Second is first place for losers.”  
“You're the second oldest in the family if you count mom.”  
“You...you’re short.” Jeremy sputtered and lost track of what he was going to say next. He had noticed a black BMW driving down the street. Jeremy looked down but it was too late, they had already stopped him. The driver side window rolled down and a curly haired kid stuck his head out.  
“Hey twitch-wad!” He shouted and the other kids in the car cackled.  
“See you at school tomorrow!” One of them yelled from the back. Jeremy quickened his pace and Lilac looked back at the boys.  
“Whoa! You better watch your sister there!” The curly haired kid called. Jeremy turned too look at Lilac but she was casually lowering her hand, Jeremy had missed whatever she did.  
“What did you just do?” He asked quietly. She made a throat-cutting gesture and pointed her thumb over her shoulder at the boys. Jeremy gave her a ‘seriously?’ look. She shrugged,  
“I’m your younger sister, I’ve gotta look out for you!”  
“Strictly speaking, I am the one who’s supposed to look out for you.” Lilac shook her head.  
“Nope, you got it all backwards.”  
“Whatever.” Jeremy said, and they continued walking home in silence.

Jeremy closed the door to the garage behind him turned around. His mother was standing right there with her arms folded and an angry expression on her face. Jeremy winced inwardly and waved, “We’re home.” He said pathetically. His mom grabbed him by the ear and pulled him into the kitchen, the Room of Lectures as he mentally called it.  
“Why are you home late?” She asked quietly. Jeremy gulped, whenever she spoke quietly he knew that she was seriously mad.  
“I-I just lost track of the time.” He stuttered a little on his explanation.  
“What’s that on your wrist?” She said accusingly. Jeremy sighed, he had already heard this counterargument before.  
“A watch.”  
“And what does a watch do?” As she continued talking, Jeremy wondered if he even was in trouble. Usually by this point his mom would either start assigning chores or yelling.  
“Tell the time.” He said quietly. She nodded, clearly satisfied to his answer.  
“Okay, did you finish emptying your room yet?” Jeremy nodded and pointed to the house phone.  
“Can I go talk to Adrian before dinner?” His mom just looked at him for a second before nodding.  
“Sure, we’re just having leftovers tonight so no rush, just make sure to eat before you go to bed.” Jeremy grabbed the phone and went off to his room.

“Evening Jeremy.” Adrian said in a fake English accent over the phone.  
“Hey Adrian. Why do you always answer like that?”  
“Like what?”  
“Evening Jeremy. Or good morning Jeremy.” He mimicked his English accent.  
“Cause I don’t get to do that accent all that often. And it’s fun, and you’re not. So I gotta be fun around you otherwise you’ll be boring.” Adrian said casually, dropping the accent.  
“Fair enough.” Jeremy said. There was a long pause before Adrian spoke.  
“So moving away huh?”  
“Yep, that stupid accident or whatever. I still don’t know how he died, my mom won’t tell me.”  
“Why not?” Adrian asked. Jeremy shrugged even though Adrian couldn’t see it.  
“She probably thinks I’m too sensitive for that kind of thing.”  
“Well she pr-“  
There was a crackling over the phone and Adrian's voice suddenly cut off. Jeremy smacked the phone a couple times and held it back up to his ear.  
“-ow or something.” Adrians voice slowly came back into focus.  
“Can you repeat that, my phone did that stupid thing again.”  
“Yea no problem. I was just saying that maybe she doesn’t know or something. Sometimes when the details of someone’s death are really dark, like a dark web thing, they don’t release the details.”  
“What do you mean a dark web thing?”  
“I don’t know, like human trafficking, or a hit-man kind of thing. Maybe he was a human trafficker and got killed cause he dipped out on a deal.”  
“Yea maybe those exact things happened and This kind guy who my mom knew and trusted back in high school turned out to be selling and buying people. Exactly that.”  
“Whatever man you know what I mean.”  
“Yea, I don’t think he’s the type to do it.”  
“You never know dude. You never know.” Jeremy’s stomach rumbled loudly.  
“Kay I gotta go, I’m starving.”  
“Alright talk to you later.”  
“Yea next time I talk to you will be from a different town. Weird huh?”  
“Oh yea you’re moving tomorrow. Dang it felt like you were moving next week yesterday.”  
“Same. Anyway, bye.”  
“See ya bro.” Jeremy hung up and walked back out into the kitchen.


	2. Chapter 2

Jeremy leaned on his pillow cramped and squished in the backseat of the car. He had tried his best to sleep during the car drive there but had ultimately failed. Lilac had somehow fallen asleep in the first few minutes of the ride leaving Jeremy alone with his mother. She disliked being talked to while she drove so Jeremy just quietly played games on his phone. He yawned in an attempt to trick his body into being tired but he felt as wide awake as ever.

“Almost there.” Julia Fitzgerald said. Jeremy peeked over the seats from the back and smiled up at her. She saw him through the mirror and smiled back.

“You holding up okay back there?” She asked Jeremy quietly to avoid waking Lilac.

“Yea it’s pretty cozy back here.” Julia nodded and focused back on the road. Jeremy sighed and opened the last game on his phone that he hadn’t grown tired of and prepared for the home stretch of the ride.

“Here!” Julia said as she pulled into an unfamiliar street. Jeremy jolted awake and looked around, the area surrounding them didn’t look terribly old, but not new either. Julia opened her car door and stretched, then walked over to the backseat car door. She slid it open and gently unbuckled Lilac and picked her up. Jeremy watched his mom carry his younger sister into the unfamiliar apartment and come back to remove the bags and boxes from the seat allowing him to flip the seats down and climb out. He stretched and groaned loudly, his joints popping, he sighed in satisfaction and grabbed the closest box to bring into his new apartment. It was fairly large for an apartment, and clean. There was that strange undefinable smell of a new place to it as well. Lilac was laying on a dark green couch against the wall, fast asleep. Jeremy set the box down on the floor and walked out to grab another.

“So where do you think you want to work?” Julia asked as she boiled water for spaghetti on the stove.

“I’m not sure, I don’t know what’s around here. I’m thinking of maybe a fast food place…” He trailed off as he saw him mom shaking her head.

“What?” He asked confused.

“Do not work at a fast food place unless they pay really good. 90% of the time you’re going to be underpaid and overworked and you’ll hate your manager and…just don’t. I want you to get a good part-time job that pays well and won’t overwork you. You need to save time for school and such.” Julia spoke wearily due to the fact that it was almost 11:00 PM.

“Right okay. Is there a grocery store nearby? Maybe I could get a cashier job there.” Julia shrugged.

“I think so. I’m not sure though, think about it and we’ll drive around town to find options.” Jeremy nodded and his mom yawned.

“I can finish up boiling pasta, you can sit down for a minute.” Julia nodded slowly and set the wooden spoon down. She walked over to the couch and sat next to Lilac who was still out cold. Jeremy continued to stir the noodles and looked over at his mom again. She had her head propped against her hand and was fast asleep. After he got the noodles cooked and the sauce made, he gently shook his mom and Lilac awake for dinner. There was absolute silence as they ate and you could almost feel the tiredness in the air. 

As soon as his mom and Lilac finished, they left to bed leaving Jeremy to the dishes. He washed them and set them out to dry then at down on the couch and massaged his legs. They were sore after being cramped in a small place for hours and then used to lift heavy boxes for another hour. Jeremy looked out the window towards the town and had a sense of vertigo as he realized how far down it was. The apartment building must be on a hill or something. There was a beautiful view of the town lit up by streetlights and car’s headlights. He felt alone, and scared almost. It was a whole new life for him now, no way back, only forwards. He slowly felt fatigue catching up to him and he laid down on the unfamiliar couch to finally get some sleep.

Jeremy dreamed of nothing which was fairly abnormal. He usually had strange or lucid dreams every night but last night there was nothing. Jeremy sat up and stretched his arms while groaning loudly. He didn’t see anybody around so he assumed that everybody was still asleep. He swung his legs out and stood up slowly, his vision swam for a moment and he felt lightheaded. He rubbed his eyes and held still while the moment passed. He walked over to his new pantry and opened it, searching for where they had left the cereal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So chapter posting will happen around every 3 days. I’m trying to give myself enough time to write new ones in between each post. So if I need a break to catch up on my chapters I’ll let y’all know and take a week long break to catch up. I hope you enjoyed the chapter!


	3. Chapter 3

Jeremy watched out the window as his mom drove around town. They were looking for a suitable place for Jeremy to work. 

“How about that Applebee’s?” Julia asked.

“They serve alcoholic drinks there don’t they?” Jeremy asked.

“Well it is a bar, I’ve never actually wondered if they had beer or not. I guess they do.” Jeremy shook his head, “Not there.” Julia sighed.

“Dude you gotta pick somewhere.” She sounded exhausted. They drove in silence for a while longer before Julia pointed to a small convenience store with a gas station out front.

“How about there?” Julia slowed down and turned into the parking lot. They got out of the car and walked in. When they opened the door the first thing they saw as they walked in was a teenager that seemed to have more rings and tattoos than skin. He looked over at them and sighed audibly. He dropped the mop he was holding to clean a spill on the floor and walked over behind the counter.

“What can I do for you?” He said with absolutely no emotion. Julia smiled faintly, “Just looking.” She just barely shook her head at Jeremy and browsed the aisles for a second before walking out quickly.

“You are  _ never _ working there.” She said and Jeremy nodded in agreement. She sighed and unlocked the car. 

“Let’s keep looking for a bit longer, then we need to head back and eat some lunch.” Jeremy nodded and got in the car. 

Thirty minutes later, they drove back in defeated silence. Every place they found either Jeremy wasn’t qualified to work there, or the place looked like you’d get killed there.

“I’m sorry bud but I don’t know where else you could work.” Jeremy nodded and sighed.

“I-I just don’t know what else we can do…” she sniffles and Jeremy realized in shock that she was crying. He leaned over and rubbed her shoulder, “It’s okay Mom, I’ll find something.” She smiled through tears and ruffled his brown hair.

“You always do don’t you?” Jeremy suddenly noticed a brightly painted building across the street.

“Wait what’s that?” Jeremy pointed out the drivers side window. Julia glances quickly over at it, “How did we miss that?” She quickly turned on her turning signal and pulled into the parking lot.

“It looks like an arcade? Or a restaurant?” Jeremy said hesitantly.

“It doesn’t look shady or anything, it looks promising.” Julia nodded and smiled at him.

“Shall we proceed?” Jeremy nodded.

They got out of the car and pushed the doors open to the brightly lit building. Inside was a cacophony of screaming kids and beeping arcade machines. There were three animalistic robots up on the stage singing some irritating children’s song. Several kids were gathered around a short, rotund statue of a cartoonish kid...no it was another robot that was handing out balloons to the kids. It would inflate them from its mouth and tie it to a string that was dispensed from its permanently clenched hand. There was a counter in the corner that had all sorts of plush versions of the animal robots and toys hanging from the wall behind it. There was a skinny puppet or something standing in a purple box and, being moved by strings attached to the ceiling. It’s movements were fluid and smooth as it danced slowly. Jeremy watched as a kid approached the puppet with a handful of tickets. The puppet stretched its hand out and rolled the tickets past its eyes, presumably scanning them. He heard a faint, male robotic voice that said, “Great job! You have a grand total of...forty...seven...tickets. Please pick a prize!” The puppet gestured to the wall of prizes and the kid pointed to a plush of the bunny looking one. The puppet reached up from its place and grabbed the plush gently with its long fingers. It handed the toy to the kid and he squealed and ran off. The puppet resumed dancing but almost seemed more lively. It seemed to look at Jeremy for a second and pause. But immediately resumed dancing.

“Excuse me?” Jeremy heard Julia say. He turned to see her talking to one of the guys behind the kitchen counter. He walked over as the guy pointed to an open doorway leading to a hall.

“Down there, take a left and it’s the first room on the right.  _ Not _ the employees only room.” Julia nodded and smiled.

“Thank you.” Julia started walking and Jeremy followed. As they passed the employees only door, Jeremy felt a chill. He looked at it and jumped as he realized it was open. It wasn’t open a second before. He hesitated, and looked at his mom continuing down the hall then reluctantly followed her. She turned into the room and waited patiently by the doorway Jeremy walked over to her and saw a short man talking quietly on a cradle phone.

“Yes honey I know it’s such short notice. I’ll be back a week after I can get someone hired. For training. Yes a different place then the last one. Yes I brushed my teeth.” He looked up at the two people waiting in the doorway and held up a finger.

“Yes, hold on honey. What can I do for you?” He set the phone down and smiled.

“Hi my son is looking for a job here.” Julia said in her business voice. She only used that voice when either Jeremy or Lilac were in trouble, or when she was talking to a customer or her boss.

“Oh perfect, absolute perfect. He couldn’t have picked a better time.” The man said in relief. He redirected his smile towards Jeremy.

“And what’s your name young man? I assume that you’re the one who wants the job?” Jeremy nodded.

“I’m Jeremy, Jeremy Fitzgerald.” He shook the mans hand.

“Wonderful.” He said. If you can come in tonight for your orientation and tour, that would be ideal but I understand if you can’t.” Jeremy was shocked and he looked over at his mom. She nodded slightly and smiled at him.

“Y-Yea sure. I can do that.” Jeremy stammered a little bit.

“Lovely, I’ll see you later tonight then. Around 11” The man said and returned the phone to his face.

“Sorry about that, I’ll be home in a week then. Yes I just hired someone. Alright pumpkin I’ll bring home something for the kids.”

Julia patted Jeremy's back and they walked out the door.

“You ready for your new job? At least it sounds like you got the job. There wasn’t really even an interview but I guess maybe he’ll do it tonight.”

“Yea maybe. How should I dress?”

“Nicely, but my concern is how late you’re supposed to show up. Are they even open that late?” Julia said worriedly as she opened the door to the car.

“I mean they have to be don’t they? Otherwise I couldn’t be there.” Jeremy said, buckling his seatbelt.

“I guess so. Just...make sure that you’re being polite and considerate. Every little thing counts, but don’t stress too much about it.”

“So worry about everything that I’m doing, but don’t stress.” Jeremy said sarcastically. Julia elbowed him, “Oh shut up. You know what I mean.” She said with a grin. Jeremy sighed and looked out the car window. He couldn’t lie to himself, he was incredibly nervous. If he couldn’t get this job then they wouldn’t have enough money to support themselves. He wouldn’t let himself think about what would happen after that. Jeremy Fitzgerald wasn’t going to let his family down.


	4. Chapter 4

Jeremy adjusted his blue polo shirt as his mom drove him to Freddy’s. It was close enough to walk, but Julia wanted to accompany him to his interview. Not to the actual interview, he made absolute sure of. But he couldn’t stop her from driving him there. He had chosen his favorite polo shirt with dark slacks that seemed to be a good in-between of comfortable and nice. His mom had approved of the outfit which he was surprised about. She typically didn’t allow him outside the house without changing at least one article of clothing. His sense of style wasn’t nearly as refined as hers. He saw the lights of Freddy’s approaching closer and closer. And all the while his anxiety increased more and more. Julia rested a hand on his shoulder, “Relax Jer-bear. You’ll get the job easily.” He nudged her at the mention of her favorite nickname for him. She smirked at him and turned into the parking lot. Jeremy couldn’t concentrate on what was happening, he was starting to panic and his mind went foggy. His mom turned his head towards her and looked him in the eyes.

“Listen to me Jeremy Fitzgerald. You will be just fine. Now get out there, and make those pizzas or flip those burgers or whatever you’ll be doing. Do it, and do it the best you can. Nobody can ask for more from you. Got it?” Jeremy nodded and smiled shakily, “Got it.”

“Good. Now get out of my car.” 

Jeremy pushed on the doors of the pizzaria. There was a single family in a corner booth that seemed to be ready to leave. The robots were gone from the stage, presumably for maintenance. The puppet was still dancing in its box however, despite the arcade machines being silent and empty. The man Jeremy had talked to earlier walked into the large room and waved to Jeremy.

“Over here!” He called. Jeremy walked over quickly and held out his hand to shake. The guy shook it firmly and smiled.

“Welcome to Freddy Fazbears. How ya feeling?” He asked.

“I’m good how are you?” Jeremy said quickly. Then mentally kicked himself for answering too fast.

“Good, good. Missin’ the missus but what can ya do?” He smiled and Jeremy wondered for a second if he should laugh at what might have been a joke.

“Come with me. It’s time for your tour.” The man said and walked over to the stage. He climbed up the stairs leading to the stage and went behind the curtain.

“W-wait, what about the interview?” Jeremy asked nervously. The man sounded suspiciously like he had already hired him.

“You’re hired. It’s one of those psychological interviews where I judge your response to your surroundings. I’ll be able to see you working and at the end of a five day period, I’ll decide if you’re hired or not.” Jeremy was about to respond but suddenly there was a click, then a few seconds later, the three animatronics slowly walked out from behind the curtain. They started waving and moving in their own special ways. The bear, presumably Freddy, wiggled its ears, the chicken raised its plate and the little cupcake spun around, the bunny strummed it’s guitar and spun its ears. Jeremy raised an eyebrow and jumped at the sound of a bell from behind him. He turned and saw the family leaving. The man peeked out from behind the curtain and sighed in relief.

“Finally.” He hopped off the stage and walked over to lock the doors. He held up a wristband to the handle. It clicked and the lights outside shut off. The animatronics walked back a few steps and shut down as the curtains swung closed automatically. A few lights in the room shut off leaving just enough to see. The man looked around nervously, “Alright, fortunately the last manager here said that there were several recordings left behind to teach you your job. Security office is down there, and kid? Let me be clear with you. You don’t need to worry alright? This jobs is easy. You’re really just here for legal purposes. We need to have a guard here in case of a lawsuit, but the guard doesn’t even really need to do anything. The animatronics...well they said the recording would explain the deal with them. Anyways, have a good night.” He smiled then he suddenly widened his eyes and groaned.

“Aww I did it again didn’t I? It’s so sorry, introducing myself always slips the mind. My name’s Chase Allen. You can call me Chase. Also remember that your shift ends at 6. I can give you a ride tonight because of the short notice, but for the rest of the nights you’ll need to arrange your own ride.” He held his wristband up to the lock and let himself out waving as he left. Jeremy was shocked on multiple levels, he had an office? He was supposed to be a nightguard? What was the deal with the...animatronics? He glanced down the hall, then he saw movement out of the corner of his eye. The puppet was still dancing, he stared at it for a moment. It was incredibly creepy in the dark, it’s too smooth movements and it’s mask was too much for Jeremy. He walked down the hall that Chase had gestured to. He had just had an insurmountable amount of responsibility forced upon him. He wasn’t sure if he was up for the task.

“-Do the best you can, nobody can ask for more from you.” Julia’s voice echoed in his head. He steeled himself in determination, he was  _ not _ going to give up now.


	5. Chapter 5

Jeremy walked through the large door-less doorway and examined the room. There were several monitors or something stacked up in the corners near him, and two large vent openings on opposite sides of the room. A desk sat near the wall that was cluttered with papers and a Fazbear branded drink cup. A large fan that seemed to be a hundred years old spun on the wooden table. He sat in a wooden chair behind the table and noticed a small answering machine that seemed to be just as old as the fan, a tiny red light was blinking on it. He hesitated, then pressed the play button.

“Hello, hello?” Came a voice from the speaker in the machine.

“Uh, hello and welcome to your new summer job at the new and improved Freddy Fazbear's Pizza. Uh, I'm here to talk you through some of the things you can expect to see during your first week here and to help you get started down this new and exciting career path.” Jeremy raised an eyebrow and leaned forwards, resting his elbows on the desk. This sounded like it would drag on for a while.

“Uh, now, I want you to forget anything you may have heard about the old location, you know. Uh, some people still have a somewhat negative impression of the company. Uh... that old restaurant was kind of left to rot for quite a while, but I want to reassure you, Fazbear Entertainment is committed to family fun and above all, safety. They've spent a small fortune on these new animatronics, uh, facial recognition, advanced mobility, they even let them walk around during the day. Isn't that neat?” The man cleared his throat.

“But most importantly, they're all tied into some kind of criminal database, so they can detect a predator a mile away. Heck, we should be paying them to guard you.

Uh, now that being said, no new system's without its... kinks.” Jeremy grimaced at the sound of that. If this job was the slightest bit dangerous then his mom would probably make him quit.

“Uh... you're only the second guard to work at that location. Uh, the first guy finished his week, but complained about... conditions. Uh, we switched him over to the day shift, so hey, lucky you, right? Uh mainly he expressed concern that certain characters seemed to move around at night, and even attempted to get into his office.”

Jeremy froze and instinctively looked up towards the large gaping hallway in front of him, he wasn’t afraid of the dark but now would be a good time to see if anything was approaching him.

“Now, from what we know, that should be impossible. Uh, that restaurant should be the safest place on earth. So while our engineers don't really have an explanation for this, the working theory is that... the robots were never given a proper "night mode". So when it gets quiet, they think they're in the wrong room, so then they go try to find where the people are, and in this case, that's your office. So our temporary solution is this: there's a music box over by the Prize Counter, and it's rigged to be wound up remotely. So just, every once in a while, switch over to the Prize Counter video feed and wind it up for a few seconds. It doesn't seem to affect all of the animatronics, but it does affect... one of them.” The man cleared his throat again and Jeremy sat back in shock. They wandered around? That alone was crazy, but they also tried to approach someone? At night? He couldn’t imagine how creepy that would be to see one of those things following him.

“Uh, and as for the rest of them, we have an even easier solution. You see, there may be a minor glitch in the system, something about robots seeing you as an exoskeleton without his costume on, and wanting to stuff you in a suit, so hey, we've given you an empty Freddy Fazbear head, problem solved! You can put it on anytime, and leave it on for as long as you want. Eventually anything that wandered in, will wander back out.” Jeremy gaped in shock and glanced around, he saw the costume head behind him as well as a tablet and flashlight. He grabbed the head and lifted the tablet up, it flickered on as soon as he did and revealed a security camera system. He switched rooms several times until he found the prize corner. He saw a circular meter about half empty and the purple box that held the puppet. He wound up the box and continued listening.

“Uh, something else worth mentioning is kind of the modern design of the building. You may have noticed there are no doors for you to close, heh. But hey, you have a light! And even though your flashlight can run out of power, the building cannot. So, don't worry about the place going dark. Well, I think that's it. Uh, you should be golden. Uh, check the lights, put on the Freddy head if you need to, uh, keep the music box wound up, piece of cake. Have a good night, and I'll talk to you tomorrow.” 

Jeremy looked up and shone the light down the hall. It didn’t quite reach the end of the hallway but it was enough to see that it was empty. He breathed a sigh of relief and checked the cameras. Everything was silent and in its place, in one room there was some sort of metal scrap heap that looked out of place in a “kids” cove. He switched back to the prize corner and was shocked to see how quickly the meter had gone down. He quickly held down the rewind button and shone the light down the hall. Still empty, he checked the building and almost missed the missing chicken. He switched back to the camera and panicked as he saw that the chicken or duck or whatever was gone. He panicked and immediately turned his flashlight to the hall. Empty, he looked back at the camera and saw it in the hallway leading to his hall. He panicked and switched back to the main stage. The others were still there, he switched back to the other hallway. It was gone, suddenly he heard clanging footsteps coming slowly down the hall. He immediately turned on his flashlight and saw it standing just in sight of his light, slowly and carefully walking towards him. Jeremy’s mind went blank as he panicked, he stood up and walked backwards away from it. His back hit the wall and he closed his eyes. This was it, this was where he died. His foot hit something on the floor and he looked down. The Freddy Fazbear costume head, he picked it up and slammed it onto his head. Would it matter if they saw him put it on? He heard a buzzing and saw the chicken just a few feet from him on the opposite side of the desk. It’s head was shaking and it’s eyes had gone black with a single white speck in the center. He noticed for the first time that it’s beak was missing, that was strange. It didn’t move for several precious seconds, but then turned around and walked out remarkable quicker than it had entered. Jeremy sighed in relief and removed the mask. A red light was flashing urgently on the tablet and he picked it up, the prize corner button was glowing ominously red. He switched to it and nearly lost it right then and there as he saw the music meter just a sliver away from emptying. He wound it up just in time, wishing it would go faster. He flipped through the cameras and groaned as he saw the bunny missing. How was he going to survive this night let alone every night?


	6. Chapter 6

Jeremy lowered the tablet quickly and checked the vents. He quickly learned that they weren’t very good at sneaking. Their clanging footsteps were very obvious as they marched down the hall or climbed through vents. He checked the time, 4 AM. His shift ended at 6 AM, two more hours. Jeremy was almost having fun at this point, he checked the hallway and saw the chicken standing a distance down the hall. Jeremy jumped a little and put the mask on, he hadn’t heard Freddy approach. Jeremy removed the mask and wiped his brow. The mask smelled coppery and had loose fake fur all over the inside, it was making his face feel sweaty and gross. He was glad that he wore comfortable clothing that breathed well.

An hour later and Jeremy felt laser focused, it was fairly simple with just the three of them. That scrap heap in the kids cove didn’t even look functional, and the balloon kid thing looked harmless. His only problems were the puppet, and the animatronics. He saw movement out of the corner of his eye and quickly put the Freddy mask on. The bunny crawled out of the vent and turned its head to look at him. It shook slightly for a few seconds before climbing to its feet and walking out. Jeremy was amazed at the complexity of the robots, from what he had heard of robotics nowadays, they had barely gotten them to start walking let alone getting to their feet.

Jeremy rubbed his eyes and checked the hallway, then the two vents. Just a few minutes until his shift ended, then Chase would come unlock the doors and he could escape. Well...escape until he had to come back the next day. He needed to figure out some way to survive this, long term solutions only. He felt lethargic from the lack of sleep combined with stress. How was he supposed to do this for a living? He felt a chill down his spine as he realized that he would need to somehow leave the relative safety of his office to get home. What would he tell his mother? Clanking footsteps echoed down the dark hallway and he snapped out of his thoughts. Jeremy's eyes flickered to the clock on the table and almost leapt out of his seat as he realized it was nearly 6 AM. He remembered just in time to put his mask on for the bear to walk in. He stared at it through terrified eyes and wondered if it’s own face would fool it. A few stressful seconds passed before it turned to leave. The idea that it was fooled by its own face was outrageously funny to him, and he couldn’t hold back a snort. The animatronic bear stopped and held still for a moment, Jeremy froze as well and caught his breath. There were several seconds of silence before it turned slowly around and stared at him. Not at the mask, at Jeremy.


	7. Chapter 7

Jeremy gulped and stared the bear in its...black eyes? He swore when he saw it earlier, they had been plastic and real-looking, but now they were black with a single burning white light in the middle. He heard them whir and refocus on him, then it took a step forward. Jeremy was out of the chair in a flash, he dived towards the right vent and wriggled through it. There were clunks as the bear attempted to follow him. He felt its plastic hand brush his foot which sent a wave of shock through him. If he had moved a second later...he wouldn’t dwell on it. Jeremy prayed that one of the other robots wasn’t in this very vent. He army crawled forwards, remembering another time just like this, crawling through a similar vent. The boy rubbed his neck, it hurt again. Fortunately, luck was on his side as he stuck his head out the other end and saw an empty room. He clambered out of the vent and peeked into the hallway, the bear was still peeking into the vent. Freddy was its name wasn’t it? He looked down the other end of the hallway and leapt back into the room, the chicken was just turning around the corner. Jeremy slid under a table and held his breath, the chicken walked into the room and stood just to the side of it.

“They’re setting a trap.” He thought to himself, “How are they smart enough to do that? Why are they smart enough?” It didn’t show any signs of moving so Jeremy crawled out from under the table as slowly as possible. He kept an eye on it and backed out of the room. As soon as Jeremy was out into the hallway he breathed a silent sigh of relief, he had to get out of there. He saw the door that led to parts and service was slightly cracked, maybe he could hide in there until things died down.

Jeremy closed the door as quietly as possible, slowly turning the knob until the latch was fully closed. It was pitch black inside, he knelt down and held his hands out on the floor in order to feel for any scraps of metal or things that would make too much noise if he stepped on. He stepped forwards carefully feeling nothing but the cold tile floor. His finger gently hit a heavy chunk of metal. He froze and stepped around it, it was quite large, and fuzzy feeling for some reason. It felt unmovable, not that he tried very hard to move it. He nestled in between another large piece of what he assumed was scrap metal and the wall, there were a couple pipes leading from the floor to the wall that were uncomfortable to lean up against. He held his breath as he heard two sets of metallic footsteps clanking down the hall, the sounds echoed throughout the building creepily. They slowly faded into the distance, Jeremy stood slowly and almost had a heart attack as bells started ringing from speakers in the building.

“It must be the signal for the end of my shift.” Jeremy thought, it was strange that they had such a peculiar way of announcing it but at the moment he didn’t mind. The worn out teen was just relieved that he was still alive, his hands were shaking to pieces from the intensity of the night. He stepped past the scrap metal, and winced as it fell over with a loud clang. He paused and listened, it didn’t sound like they were coming. He continued, accidentally stepping on a strangely soft part of a large chunk of metal. It let out a cheery honk that scared the life out of him. He shakily stepped over it and opened the door leading out of the room. 

In the main party room, Jeremy glanced at the three animatronics standing inactive at the stage, the curtains were open again and each robot was in their own place. He cautiously walked up to each one to examine them, keeping a safe distance and then some. Their eyes were no longer black but their standard eye color. None of them seemed to notice or acknowledge his presence. He walked out of the building and pulled at the glass doors futilely, they were still locked. He waved at a car that was just pulling into the parking lot, he assumed it was Chase coming to pick him up. Sure enough the man himself got out of the car and jogged to the doors. He held up his wristband, which Jeremy noticed had a yellow light glowing on it, to the door and unlocked it.

“Morning Jeremy. How was your shift?” He asked pleasantly when he pushed the doors open. 

“J-just fine.” He stammered a bit and smiled as best as he could. Chase nodded and gestured to his car, “Guess we should be getting on our way then.” Jeremy nodded and followed him to the car.


	8. Chapter 8

It was a primarily silent drive back, Jeremy gave directions but not much conversation. Finally Chase cleared his throat and asked nervously, “So, are you planning on staying on the job?” Jeremy paused and thought, he didn’t really have much of a choice. Where else could he work? The gas station was sounding much more appealing.

“I think so.” He said and opened his mouth to say more but Chase interrupted him.

“I’m sorry.” Jeremy raised and eyebrow.

“For...what?” He asked.

“You seemed like you had just seen a ghost when I came back so I assume… well and the fact that the curtains were open again… and…” he sighed, “The animatronics move at night don’t they? Not just occasionally to keep their servers from locking up or whatever, but they try to...find you...don’t they?” Chase asked. Jeremy looked at his employers worried expression reflected in the rear view mirror.

“Yes...yes they do.” Chase was silent for a moment, then he sighed again.

“I should’ve known. But..why?” He muttered to himself.

“What do you mean?” Jeremy asked, the man seemed like he had just been told that World War Three had just been started.

“Listen, Jeremy. You’re a smart kid, and I can tell you need this job. All I can say, all the advice I can give, just...don’t ever give up. Don’t let them get you, use what you can. Don’t be afraid to cheat the system, the last guy I knew who worked a similar job.” He smiled and seemed distant.

“Well, let’s just say he wasn’t afraid to get mean. If his life was threatened he threatened back. He was coarse and angry, but when you got down deep, was a great guy.” He focused back on Jeremy, “Just get through your trainee week, it will only get more difficult from here, I won’t lie to you. Just promise, I’ll be able to see you again, and not in a police report?” He seemed almost about to cry. Jeremy nodded numbly, he was confused as to why the man was so attached already but disregarded it. Chase smiled and reached into a pocket, he removed a wristband with a flashing grey light on it as well as a name badge with his name on it. “Jeremy F.” , he figured they couldn’t fit his whole name on it so they abbreviated it.

“That wristband will grant you access to different things, they’ll let you in and out of the building, but only before and after your shift. You can request the...puppet...to keep a special eye on certain people, and you get a special discount for all food and drink purchases at the counter. He smiled but Jeremy held up a finger.

“What was that about the puppet?” He asked. Chase nodded and said, “Oh, as well as hand out prizes, the puppet monitors children with wristbands that the parents can give to their child upon entering the building. It will ensure that they don’t leave or enter restricted areas and make sure they aren’t approached by strangers.” He sighed and glanced at Jeremy.

“There was a...uh...incident. That happened a while back. Involving Fazbear security and a few children, it was a horrible incident and I promise that Fazbear Entertainment remedied the accident immediately. One of the founders, Henry Emily...he supposedly came up with the idea of the puppet.” Jeremy pointed down a road to indicate where his apartment was. He didn’t want to interrupt the story. Chase nodded, turned, and continued.

“The other founder, William Afton...according to rumor was initially against it. But eventually decided to create the animatronic. Henry was never the one to build them, more like the one who thought of them. They were a team...supposedly. I only heard this from my predecessor.” Jeremy nodded, he was only assuming what had happened, but from what he gathered the incident was truly horrible. How hadn’t he heard about this before?

“This next house here is mine.” He said after an awkward silence. Chase nodded and turned into his driveway, “There you are.”

“Thank you for the ride Miste- I mean Chase.” Chase chuckled and unlocked the doors.

“Of course, have a good night Jeremy.” Chase smiled, and waved. The worn out boy unlocked the car and stepped out. He saw his mother standing outside the apartment doors waiting for him. Her face changed from that of a worried mother, to relieved and exhausted.

“There you are, I was worried that you wouldn’t be able to find a ride home.” She smiled and waved to Chase as he pulled out of the apartment parking lot.

“I’m not exactly comfortable with you getting a ride home with that man.” Julia grimly said.

“Yea he said that that would be the only time that he could give me a ride. I’ll need to figure out how to…” he trailed off as his mother held out her hand, “What?” He asked confusedly. She rolled her eyes and tossed something to him. Jeremy caught it and knew exactly what they were from the feel of them.

“Your keys? But don’t you need-“ 

“Nope.” She interrupted, “There’s an old woman next door who owns a laptop she has from her deceased son. She’s allowed me to use it to find a job slash work from. I’ll need to keep an eye on your sister. I’m having some difficulty finding her a suitable school, so she’ll be home with me while you’re at school.”

“I assume you had no trouble finding a place to stick me then.” He asked dryly.

“Of course not, due to some paperwork or whatever. You won’t be starting for a day or two, but rest assured that you’ll be busy during the day. You can borrow my alarm clock to wake you up for work, 11:15 sharp. Every night, until you can get transferred to something less...dangerous.” Jeremy looked at her, just now realizing he was nearly as tall as her. Not much of an achievement due to the fact that she was as short as short gets. But nonetheless made him feel adult.

“It’s not necessarily dangerous mom.” She raised an eyebrow, “Go on?”

“You see, the animatronics can basically defend themselves and others. They have facial recognition software that’s tied into a criminal database or whatever. They can, and I quote, “Detect a predator from a mile away.” Julia scoffed and gave him a look.

“Doubtful, they probably just say that for legal purposes. Your sister should be waking up soon, keep quiet and go take a shower.” Julia slowly opened the apartment door and let Jeremy home.


	9. Chapter 9

Jeremy woke up and had a brief moment of disconcerting fear. For a second he had no clue where he was and why it was so bright outside. Then last night's events came crashing back into his mind and he groaned. His head fell back into his pillow and he closed his eyes, hoping it was just a bad dream. But no, it was all too real, all too horribly real. He opened his eyes again, no point in hiding from it, and stood to go eat...breakfast? Lunch? Who knew at this point? He grumbled quietly and shivered as he walked down the stairs to the kitchen. His mother looked up as he stepped onto the landing and frowned.

“Shouldn’t you be asleep? It’s the middle of the day?” She said jokingly.

“Hardy har.” He grumbled and opened the cupboard above the fridge to get the cereal.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Julia asked.

“Eating breakfast.” He practically grunted.

“Not at one in the morning you’re not.” She reached out and pulled the empty bowl away from him. Jeremy tiredly reached a hand out for it back but Julia replaced the bowl in the cupboard.

“Mmmreeeeeemmmmmm.” Jeremy moaned and plopped his head on the table. She ignored her eldest son's theatrics and jangled the car keys that Jeremy had left on the counter before going to bed.

“We’re driving to Freddy’s for lunch.” She said. An electrical shock went down his spine and he sat upright, very suddenly and violently awake.

“Wha-why?” He asked, trying to hide his apprehensive and panicked tone.

“Oh I just figured that you would be so exciting d to go back that you just wouldn’t be able to wait.” She said sarcastically, then pointed into the living room.

“She’s why. She wanted to go see where you were working and we haven’t eaten lunch yet so I figured that...well...Freddy’s fit both categories.” Jeremy heard Lily talking to herself as she played in the other room. Were they really going to go to the one place that he’d gotten the closest to dying? Well...the second place.

“A-are you sure?” He asked, stammering a little. Julia frowned, “Yes...why? How come you’re acting so weird all of a sudden?”

“Who says he’s acting?” Lily poked in her head and added with a grin. Julia smiled, “Hey honey. Are you ready to go?” Lily nodded and ran to the garage. Julia followed her leaving the door open just a crack. Jeremy sighed and went to go out some shoes on.

Lily waited impatiently by the doors to Freddy’s while Julia and Jeremy got out of the car.

“Come on come on!” She hopped in place as they walked over. As soon as they got to the doors, Lily ran inside and looked around. Jeremy walked quickly up to her and grabbed her hand.

“Stay with me Lil.” He said, eyeing the very same animatronics that had attempted to kill him last night.

“Why? I thought this place was, ‘the safest place on earth?’” She did finger quotes when she said that.

“Where’d you hear that?” Julia asked, catching up with them clutching an orange wristband. Lily pointed to a poster hung up by the front doors.

“There. The safest place on earth. It was talking about Freddy, Chica, and Bonnie...and the Marionette.” Lily said the last name and pointed to the prize counter. The puppet dancer slowly and gracefully in its box. Julia looked and her eyes widened, “Jesus that’s terrifying.” She said under her breath.

“Tell me about it.” Jeremy muttered. He was watching the animatronics up on stage closely. They showed no sign of aggression or malicious intent at all. But he still couldn’t repress a shudder as Bonnie opened his jaw and closed it. Opened...and closed. Opened...and closed. He stumbled as sleep nearly claimed him right there.

“You okay?” Julia said concernedly. “Maybe you should sit down.” She steered him to a table nearby and sat him down there.

“I’ll go get us some food. Pepperoni right?” She asked.

“Get some crushed red pepper if they have any.” Jeremy muttered and set his head on the desk.

“Whatcha doing twerp?” The kid sitting behind him whispered ferociously. Jeremy tried to ignore him and felt tears coming to his eyes. Why wouldn’t they just leave him alone? He tried wiping his eyes but the kid grabbed his arm and jerked it away causing Jeremy to hit his head on the desk. It was dark enough in the classroom that the teacher wouldn’t be able to see what was going on.

“Oh your crying? Already? You crybaby.” Jeremy felt the muscle in his bicep twitch rapidly, making his forearm wiggle.

“Friggin freak.” The kid said and squeezed his arm tightly. Jeremy felt a sob rise up in his throat and he tried to hold it back. The kid behind him started poking his back with his pencil, unfortunately he had sharpened it before the presentation, just for Jeremy.

“Leave me alone Brian.” He whispered, not able to keep the pain out of his voice.

“Only if you say it.” He pressed the pencil in harder.

“No!” Jeremy said a little louder, the teacher shifted in his chair.

“Something you need to tell the class about Mr. Fitzgerald?” Mr. Norton questioned over the sound of the video playing over the projector.

“N-no sir.” Jeremy muttered.

“Speak up, nobody can hear you.” He said.

“No sir.” Jeremy said louder. Mr. Norton nodded and turned his seat back to the projection. Brian twisted the pencil, almost piercing his skin.

“Say. It.”

“I’m a useless twitch-wad freak who doesn’t deserve to lick the dirt off of Brian Whiton’s shoes..” Jeremy whispered. Brian pushed the pencil in a bit harder then pulled it away.

“Good. Maybe tomorrow you’ll learn to say it sooner and not cause problems.” Brian whispered and leaned back. Jeremy quietly sobbed into his sleeve.

“Jeremy.” Someone called his name, he looked up. His mother was sitting next to him, a platter of delicious smelling pepperoni pizza was in the middle of the table and Lily was nowhere to be seen.

“Where’s Lily?” He asked quickly.

“She’s off playing with some new friends. Have some piz-“

“Where at?” He asked. He had to know where she was, what if she got too close to the animatronics?

“Over at the arcade. Why-?” Jeremy stood and quickly walked over to the beeping machines and sounds of excited chatter.

Julia sadly watched her only son go find her daughter. It was endearing that he cared so much for her, but also concerning that sometimes he forgot himself when helping her. It was strange their bond, they weren’t even really brother and sister. The first time they met, they interacted very rarely. And not for very long, the adoption clinic had warned her about this. That they might not grow together, that there was a high chance of issues and fights. But one night, they had just...clicked together. And now they were inseparable. 

But strangely enough, after that same night. Jeremy’s nightmares had begun, he would wake up screaming or sobbing. Clutching his throat and choking himself, it was terrifying for her. But Lily had taken it in stride, hugging her brother until the panic had gone, bringing him a glass of ice water for no reason whatsoever but somehow bringing a huge smile to his face when she did so. It was likely because of her that the nightmares had subsided, they came less and less often. But also less and less predictably, he would suddenly start complaining of pains in his neck and head in the middle of the day. He would suddenly burst into tears at the store and would have to leave to the bathroom to calm down. He would have a sudden muscle twitch or drop something. She took him to a doctor and she had proclaimed that there was nothing physically wrong with him. But maybe there was some event or something that scared him enough for these sort of things to happen.

“Not that I’m aware of.” Julia had said worriedly, she looked to Jeremy but he just shook his head. But his eyes had been blank, unseeing, like he had been remembering something unpleasant. She wasn’t stupid, something had happened that night. But neither Jeremy nor Lily would say. And as shown by the tear she had seen on Jeremy’s face when he was woken up from his nap, they were still happening.


	10. Chapter 10

Jeremy edged past two adults standing in the middle of the walkway chatting, he had apologized for bumping into people about a thousand times by now, so he was understandably tired of it. A pair of kids ran past him and nearly knocked him over, he glared at them, neither one was Lily. He didn’t want to attract attention by calling out her name, but he was starting to get desperate. If anything happened to her…anger surged in his chest and he walked a little faster. Around several arcade cabinets, he caught a glimpse of a young girl in a blue shirt. He jogged around the games but the girl wasn’t Lily. Jeremy groaned in frustration and ran his hands through his hair, where could she be? He walked up to a woman dressed in a dark brown and black uniform, she had a name tag that read ‘Emilia’

“Excuse me ma’am? I’m looking for my younger sister.” He spoke softly, not exactly sure why.

“Ma’am?” He spoke a little louder. She turned and smiled widely.

“Yes sir? How can I help you?” She spoke pleasantly but with a hint of exhaustion, she hid it well however.

“I’m looking for my little sister, she’s eight years old, very energetic, probably around a bunch of other kids?” He asked defeatedly. She sighed and her smile faded a bit.

“Hun you probably just described just about every child in the restarcade.” She said that last word like ‘rest-arcade’. Jeremy cocked his head, “Restarcade? Like...restaurant arcade?” He asked. Emilia’s smile became a bit more sincere.

“Yea. It’s just what the employees here call it.” She let out a small laugh. Jeremy smiled, “Well then I better get caught up on all of the lingo if I’m working here.” Emilia hesitated, then looked at him closer. All of a sudden a huge grin appeared on her face, “You’re Jeremy?” She asked incredulously.

“Chase was tellin’ me all about you. You work...the night shift.” The previously energetic woman suddenly seemed to lose all of her steam. Jeremy nodded grimly and looked down, “Uh...yea. I’m the night guard.” He tapped his foot and looked up at her.

“So you know about how the animatronics a-“ Emilia shushed him quickly, and shook her head.

“I’m sure that the night shift must be tiring, I’m sorry about that.” She spoke a little louder as if she was trying to announce that to the customers. Jeremy cocked an eyebrow, then noticed the camera in the corner of the room. It was panning left and right, but it had just been focused on them. He frowned then looked back to Emilia, “It sure is. Anyway, have you seen a little girl in a blue shirt and red sneakers? Brown hair?” He asked her, changing the subject back to its original topic. Emilia paused and thought for a moment.

“Well...I did see a little girl matching that description just a bit ago. She was walking over to the arcade, I think.” She pointed to the various machines that attracted most of the children's attention. Jeremy immediately started making his way over as fast as he could. At least she wasn’t over near the animatronics. He walked around the arcade machines until he saw a gathering of kids huddled around a modern looking machine.

“How does she do that?” One kid groaned in frustration and slapped the side of the machine. It was a block stacker game, the kind that always seemed rigged. There was a conspicuous missing space on one of the shelves that held vouchers for the grand prizes.

“Hey? Was this that girl wearing a blue shirt and red shoes?” Jeremy asked a nearby kid, he shrugged and said.

“I guess.” Jeremy sighed.

“What’s that supposed to me-“ he was interrupted by the sound of the puppet exclaiming in a loud pre-recorded voice.

“Wow! You’ve managed to snatch a grand prize? Great job! Here is your superb super prize!” Jeremy dashed over to the sound of its voice and saw the puppet animatronic reaching out a clawed hand for Lily.


	11. Chapter 11

The robotic fox lifted her hand and waved stiffly at the children gathered in front of her.

“Hello kiddos! My name is Foxy the Pirate and welcome to Kids Cove!” The slightly crackly recording played over the speaker in its mouth.

It was the entertainers third week, the manager of the store had been worried because there wasn’t a very positive reception to the introduction of the new Foxy. The children were mostly silent and a few had left during the middle of the show. It didn’t matter to the fox, it’s only purpose was to fulfill the commands that were programmed into it. And it did those easily and fairly fluidly.

The manager watched the new Foxy from the doorway. It’s movements weren’t nearly as fluid as the ones at the old location. There they seemed almost like someone was inside wearing them. The new Toy animatronics were quite advanced compared to anything other than the old animatronics. The only thing the Toy animatronics that was better than the old ones was the software. But without a good endoskeleton, good software is wasted. He had tried to get his hands on what remained of the old animatronics after that company executive scrapped them. But there was hardly any usable technology left behind. Just a few spare parts, the robots couldn’t even move anymore. Their servos worn and joints rusted. The manager just sighed and turned away, leaving Toy Foxy to entertain the children.

The kid noticed the adult leave and turned to his friend.

“Come on, he’s gone now.” He whispered to her.

“I don’t know about this. What if we get in trouble?” The young girl whispered back.

“We won’t. Come on, it deserves it anyways.” The girl hesitated, then nodded reluctantly. She had loved the old Foxy, and this new one wasn’t the same. Rodney approached the fox robot and looked up at it. Suddenly intimidated, he turned around and made eye contact with a few other friends of his. They nodded and stood to come up with him.

“What can I do for you kiddos?” The robot asked in its prerecorded voice. Rodney gestured for it to come closer. It knelt down on one knee, and the boy gave the signal. Two of the bigger boys shoved on the fox’s shoulder, the robot went down onto the soft carpet fairly quietly. Rodney reached for its head and pressed the button that he saw the employees press so many times. The robots eyes slowly dimmed and it went still. The girl took out her dads screwdriver and her eyes glinted.

“You’ll never be the same.” She whispered, but the robot never heard it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I’m going to be slowing down my chapter posts due to some issues at home that prevent me from being able to write as often. I’ll be posting every Wednesday from now on. And I’ll be including little intermissions like these that’ll be showing a little bit of the behind the scenes. The parts of the story that you have heard about, but never seen. Thanks to everyone who’s been so supportive of the story. Stay tuned for more and don’t forget to comment!


	12. Chapter 12

Jeremy froze in horror as the puppet stretched its hand out, its pointed fingers reflecting the fluorescent lights. He pushed past several people just in time to see the puppet grasp the small card in Lilac ’s hand. It held the card up to its mechanical eyes and they whirred for a second, then it reached into its own box and removed a large plush doll of Freddy Fazbear. Jeremy breathed for a second before walking over to Lilac .

“Whatcha doin’ big winner?” He asked, trying to keep the tension out of his voice.

“Just winning some and losing none.” She said with a smirk and grabbed her plush with both arms. Jeremy noticed a 100$ gift card for Freddy’s on the back, which he snagged and held up for his younger sister to see. It featured a picture of a different looking Fazbear, larger head, no blush marks. 

“You won the big bucks didn’t you?” He asked. Her eyes widened comically and she held her hand out for it.

“Hot damn.” She muttered. Jeremy’s eyes widened as well.

“Where’d you hear that word?” He asked.

“You.” She said sweetly with a cheeky grin.

“You better-“ he was cut off by a robotic voice.

“Mr. Fitzgerald, pleasure to meet you.” Jeremy stiffened and looked towards the puppet. It’s eyes were focused on his own and it reached out a hand to him.

“Whoaaa.” Lilac exclaimed, “She knows your name!” 

“Yep...somehow. What do you mean she?” He glanced at Lilac . She shrugged, “I think they’re a she.” And started skipping away with her plushie of Freddy.

“But it has a male...voice.” He trailed off as he realized that she wasn’t listening. He looked back at the puppet and cringed away. He really didn’t want to shake the puppets hand. Tentatively, he reached out and grasped it, the fake hand was leathery and grippy somehow. Like duct tape but not necessarily sticky. It squoze his hand and shook it gently, “Can I do anything for you?” It asked in its too smooth voice.

_ Should I ask her-it…to watch Lilac ? Do I want it watching Lilac ? _

He thought to himself, the puppet continued to stare at him and grasp his hand.

“No than...no.” He decided that there was no real point in saying “no thank you”. It wasn’t like it would make it grateful to him or anything.

“Understood, have a lovely day.” It released his hand and continued swaying and dancing in its box. Jeremy noted the strings connecting the arms and head to the ceiling. He watched the mechanism above manipulate the strings for a moment before walking away to return to his mother.

Jeremy found her sitting at the same table, staring at a spot on the enamel surface blankly. He sat down across from her and slid his plate over in front of him. Julia glanced up and smiled at him, “How’s Lil? She behaving herself?” Jeremy smirked, “And winning the entirety of the pizzarias games.” His mother raised an eyebrow, “Is she now?” Jeremy slid the card across the table and his mother grinned, “That’s quite the payload.” Jeremy nodded and took a bite of his still warm pizza slice. The cheese wasn’t as greasy as he expected from a fast food establishment. Overall, not a bad slice of pizza, Julia watched him eat the slice in a few seconds.

“Hungry? Or is it just that good?” Jeremy nodded and tapped the table swallowing his last bite. Julia smiled and looked at something past Jeremy. He turned to look and saw Lilac carting her giant Freddy plush, a huge smile was planted on her face.

“Check this out mom!” She set the bear down in a chair and sat across from it. Julia looked up and down at the bear.

“Why it’s nearly as big as you!” She said with exaggeratedly wide eyes. Lilac giggled and snatched a pizza slice on a plate left for her. 

“Did you know that the Marionette knows Jeremy?” She said around a mouthful of pizza. Julia raised a quizzical eyebrow at Jeremy. He waved a hand dismissively.

“It just knew my name by my wristband.” He held up the wristband with the pulsing grey light.

“It has some sort of identification technology in it that allows the robots to recognize me. As well as some perks.” Julia frowned and gestures for him to hold it closer. She held his wrist and examined it.

“They can’t track you with it or anything right?” She asked. Jeremy shrugged,

“I don’t think so, it’s too small for something like that. It’s likely that it just sends out a pulsing signal that the robots...can sense.” He realized how troublesome that would be when he was trying to escape from them.

“That’s an odd feature,” She commented, “What’s the point?”

“I think it’s so the animatronics can recognize me after the restaurant closes. And apparently I can...request the puppet to keep a watchful eye on someone with a customer wristband.”

Julia’s eyes widened, “Oh! That reminds me.” She rummaged in her purse and removed a blue wristband, it had no flashing light, but a slight bulge in one section told him that it still had some electronics.

“I bought one of these for you Lilac . It will make sure that I always know where you are when you’re here.” Lilac made a face as her mother slipped it over her wrist.

“Don’t make that face. It’s just a piece of plastic.” Lilac nodded and fidgeted with it for a bit.

“Anyway, what puppet were you talking about?” Julia asked Jeremy.

“It’s another one of the...robots?” He wasn’t exactly sure if it qualified as a robot.

“It hands out prizes, over there.” Jeremy pointed to the corner of the spacious room. Julia smiled uneasily when she saw it.

“That’s...unsettling. That puppet is supposed to protect kids?”

“Well I think it’s more of a camera. See how it swivels it’s head so much? It’s keeping an eye on the door, and what I assume are the kids with wristbands.” Julia nodded and looked thoughtful for a moment.

“Well I guess it sounds decent enough. I’m glad they finally put some effort into security for places like this. It’s-”

“I like her.” Lilac interrupted, still playing with her wristband.

“You do? To be frank it looks a bit creepy.” Lilac looked up at her defiantly, “Well stop being Frank then.” Julia smiled wide and ruffled Lilac ’s short, blonde, hair.

“Ohh don’t grow up sweetheart.” Julia said and scooted closer to give her daughter a hug. She grumbled a bit but accepted it.

“Someone sounds too grumpy to stay at Freddy’s.” Lilac perked up a bit, “No.” she said simply and jumped out of her chair to run off to the arcades again. Jeremy caught her arm and pulled her close for a hug of his own.

“Keep your distance from the robots, kay? Promise?” Jeremy looked her in the eye. She cocked her head and nodded hesitantly.

“Why?” She asked.

“They’re dangerous, just trust me on this.” Lilac opened her mouth to object but stopped herself.

“If you say so.” She said and hugged him back. Jeremy let her go after a second and waved as she walked away.

“What was that about?” Julia asked.

“Oh...nothing.” Jeremy said dismissively.

Hours later, long after Lilac had been tucked into bed. Jeremy woke to the sound of a faint jingle,  _ Pop goes the weasel? Really mom?  _ He thought, he slapped the top of the alarm and sat up slowly. His vision was blurry so he closed his eyes for a second. He had a slight headache, he always had when he woke up from a long nap. He threw off his covers and slipped out of bed quietly. It was dark outside, the moon was high and illuminated the ground below. Jeremy watched the stars for a second before turning around to prepare for work. This time, he’d be ready.


	13. Chapter 13

Jeremy drowsily pulled into the parking lot of Freddy’s. It was 11:40 PM, twenty minutes until his shift began. In the passenger seat next to him there was a toolbox. And in the backseat was a...surprise. It had taken a few minutes to set up, and hopefully it would assist in his endeavor to survive the night. He patted the pant leg stuffed with various bits of cloth and smiled. From his mother's car, he could see Chase lingering by the door and watching the animatronics on stage.. Jeremy opened the car door and grabbed the bundle from the back of the car, deciding to leave the toolbox for after Chase left. He approached the glass door and knocked gently. Despite that, Chase jumped a mile and held his hand over his chest. Jeremy smiled apologetically and waved, Chase smiled and opened the door.

“Evening Jeremy.” He said pleasantly. Jeremy had a painful memory of how Adrian would always say that.

“H-hey Chase.” Jeremy said and Chase stepped aside to allow him in. Jeremy walked past him and glanced around, the place was exactly how he had left it. Empty and quiet, the animatronics were already turned off and still.

“You ready for your...what is that?” Chase trailed off and pointed to the bundle of fabric in his arms.

“A friend, figured that he might be able to help a bit.” Chase cocked his head, then smiled when he realized what it was.

“Clever, reminds me of uh...a friend of mine. He was good with this sort of thing.” Jeremy looked up at him and grinned cockily.

“Surviving attacks against killer robots?” Chase snorted at Jeremy’s suddenly sarcastic comment.

“Nailed it.” Jeremy’s grin faded as he realized that Chase wasn’t joking.

“Seriously?” Chase nodded somberly, his smile gone.

“Yea...he’s not dead or anything if that’s what you’re wondering. He’s fine, he actually fixed the issue with the robots and they’re...surprisingly humanlike.” Jeremy thought about that.

“So...it was a software issue?” He asked.

“I’m not sure, Mike made it out to be like that, but there was...something else.” He clapped his hands together.

“Anyway, you need to get to work. Good luck tonight Jeremy.” The teen nodded and smiled, watching Chase leave. He wasn’t sure why, but he trusted him. There was just something...open and real about him. Jeremy walked over to the box that held the puppet and gulped, it was time to start his shift.

At the signal of the buildings lights shutting down, Jeremy made his move. He first propped up the dummy clothed in a fair approximation of the Fazbear uniform. As a finishing touch, he placed the Freddy mask on the featureless head. He hoped it would hold up underneath the weight of the animatronic head and he ended up having to rig an extra metal hanger to hold it up straight. He checked his watch, 12:01, the phone call should come any second now. Practically right on cue, it began to ring. Jeremy wondered if it was an actual phone call or if there was an actual person on the other end. Either way, the guy had just begun talking.

“Ah...hello, hello! Uh, see, I told you your first night wouldn't be a problem. You're a natural!

Uh, by now I'm sure you've noticed the older models sitting in the back room. Uh, those are from the previous location. We just use them for parts now. The idea at first was to repair them...uh, they even started retrofitting them with some of the newer technology, but they were just so ugly, you know? The smell...uh, so the company decided to go in a whole new direction and make them super kid-friendly. Uh, those older ones shouldn't be able to walk around, but if they do, the whole Freddy head trick should work on them too, so, whatever.” Jeremy frowned and flipped to the cameras in the back room. That was the room that always seemed open wasn’t it? He activated the light in the room and felt a surge of realization when he saw the broken down robots. Jeremy traced the path from the door to one of the ones sitting against the wall and realized that he had hidden right next to that very robot. He had nearly tripped over the purple one, and...had he stepped on that knock-off Freddy’s head? He shivered and continued listening.

“Uh...I love those old characters. Did you ever see Foxy the pirate? Oh wait, hold on...oh yeah, Foxy. Uh, hey listen, that one was always a bit twitchy, uh...I'm not sure the Freddy head trick will work on Foxy, uh. If for some reason he activates during the night and you see him standing at the far end of the hall, just flash your light at him from time to time. Those older models would always get disoriented with bright lights. It would cause a system restart, or something. Uh, come to think of it, you might want to try that on any room where something undesirable might be. It might hold them in place for a few seconds. That glitch might be in some of the newer models too.

One more thing - don't forget the music box. I'll be honest, I never liked that puppet thing. It was always...thinking, and it can go anywhere...I don't think a Freddy mask will fool it, so just don't forget the music box.

Anyway, I'm sure it won't be a problem. Uh, have a good night, and talk to you tomorrow.” 

Jeremy nodded as if the man on the other end could see him, then glanced at his fake Jeremy. It wouldn’t fool the fox, how was he supposed to keep it from attacking the dummy then? The head would work on any of the others but Foxy threw a wrench into his plan. A very large, pirate shaped wrench. He’d have to improvise, Jeremy looked at his double one last time, then walked down the hallway.

Chase nervously tapped the wheel of his car as he sat in his parking space. A lot rested on the boy Jeremy. Ever since the company moved him from his job at the older Freddy Fazbear’s three weeks ago, he had to stay at a friends house for a while until they could find a suitable person to work the manager position at this new Freddy’s. There wasn’t any warning, just a phone call one night at dinner telling him in a cheery voice that he was being temporarily relocated due to an unfortunate accident causing the last manager to quit. He had his suspicions that there was more to the story but years working for Fazbear Entertainment taught him to keep his mouth firmly shut. It was more likely that the old manager had poked their nose somewhere it didn’t belong or they had seen something that they shouldn’t have seen. They were probably being lobotomized or something at this very moment. He entertained himself by pondering whether or not Fazbear Entertainment would do that, then couldn’t help but glance through the dark glass doors. The windows were covered by curtains as the building did when night came, but he could see flickers of movement through the doors. He rubbed his eyes then checked his clock, he could stay out for a bit longer. He pulled out his phone and tried to remember the name of the security program that the building's cameras used.


	14. Chapter 14

The chicken walked stiffly, it was a little unsettling to watch. Jeremy crouched beneath a table in one of the party rooms. The walls were decorated with childish drawings and paper plate recreations of the animatronics. He watched the chicken slowly get to its metal knees and climb into the vent. After it had gotten far enough in, Jeremy readied himself, then quietly slid out from beneath his hiding place and slunk out the door. He checked both ways and ducked back when he saw the bright blue bunny staring at his doppelgänger. He held his breath and watched the bunny stare at the cloth dummy. It then turned and started walking down the hallway. Jeremy ducked back into the room and breathed heavily, had the robot seen him? He heard it’s clanging footsteps go past the doorway and down the hall. Jeremy waited until they were faint and peeled out the hall again, it was clear. He heard the chicken climb out of the vent in the office so he jogged as quietly as he could into the main hallway.

Jeremy creeped over to a door marked “Kids Cove!” and slipped inside. Shutting the door as quietly as possible, he quickly scanned the room. Nothing but some prop presents and a pile of scrap metal that definitely didn’t look like it belonged in a room for children. He disregarded it and focused on the tablet. The bear had moved off the stage but was nowhere in sight. Jeremy furrowed his brow and switched through several cameras before finding the statue of the boy inside the vents.

“Guess that’s not a statue then.” Jeremy muttered aloud, he stiffened as a creak came from behind him. He froze, then switched to the camera of the room he was in. The fox-like head had lifted and turned towards him. He didn’t want to move and startle it, so he flashed the light in the room a few times. The head of the metal heap shook back and forth, the limbs seemed entangled and trapped. Jeremy slowly turned his head and saw it struggling pathetically to unravel itself. He felt a pang of sympathy, even though it was heartless and emotionless, it still looked so sad just struggling there. It looked at him with its human eyes and opened its mouth. A static sound played over its speaker and it thrashed even harder. Jeremy backed up, then with a sound like shrieking, a bit of metal broke off of the twisted fox and bounced onto the tile floor. It froze, then untangled it’s limbs smoothly and stood. It had three legs planted firmly on the ground, only one foot covered by a white animatronic suit piece. A hand stuck out of where it’s neck should be and it’s two heads emerged from where an arm should be. It rose to its full height, which was near the ceiling, and the static noise intensified. Jeremy swore, then ran like hell.

Jeremy jumped on top of a table and ran across them, leaping over the gaps in between them. The previously unassuming and harmless scrap heap was now climbing along the ceiling, using the panels and hanging light fixtures as handholds. It’s teeth glinted in the dim light and it’s eyes had turned the same jet black with the burning white pinprick of light in the center. Jeremy leapt up onto the stage where Freddy was standing before and snatched up a prop present. The fox hissed with a burst of static, there weren’t any good enough handholds to get to Jeremy above the stage area so it remained outside it. The worn out boy caught his breath and eyed the metallic monster hanging from the ceiling. It didn’t seem like it should be capable of climbing the way it had, the coordination and weight problem should have prevented it. But somehow, it dangled from the panels above like a twisted chandelier. Jeremy walked the length of the stage trying to figure out a way to get past the fox monster. It stalked him from outside the stage, staring at him with white pinprick eyes. Jeremy feinted left and tried running right. The fox screeched again and bought his trick. It stumbled a little as it tried to switch directions against its momentum and fumbled to the ground with a deafening crash. Jeremy heard clanking footsteps heading his way and knew he only had a few seconds before the other animatronics investigated the noise. He dashed past the scrap heap and vaulted over a table to find a bathroom to hide in. That’s when he ran full tilt into one of the animatronics themselves.


	15. Chapter 15

Jeremy tumbled into the short animatronic and sent it and himself crashing to the tiled floor. He rolled and got to his feet fairly quickly before turning to see the robot that he’d jumped on. It was the “statue” robot. It’s boyish face had no moving parts so it’s features were frozen in an eternal smile. It seemed stuck on the ground, it’s rotund figure preventing it from rolling to its feet. Jeremy watched it for a moment, feeling a bit sorry for it. He then remembered the last time he felt sympathy for one of these animatronics, and ran. Behind him, he heard a faint “Hello.” from the short boy. But he disregarded it and turned the corner into the main hall. As he turned however, the tablet slipped from his grasp and slid beneath the door to Parts and Service. He paled, then out of the corner of his eye saw Bonnie charging towards him with an arm outstretched like a zombie. Freddy followed at a slower pace, like he was making sure Jeremy didn’t try to slip past the bunny.

“How smart are these things?” Jeremy muttered in frustration. He turned around and saw the fox crawling on the ground towards him, it was fortunately significantly slower than before, but still making decent time. He figured it was his only option and dashed for the fox. Right before he was about to jump over it, the machine leapt up and snapped at him catching his shoe and sending him crashing to the ground. He tugged his foot out of his footwear and scrambled to his feet. The robot child was still on its back and helplessly repeating the same greeting over and over. Jeremy went around it just in case and ran over by the prize counter. He ducked down behind the counter and closed his eyes. He could hear a faint jingle for some reason, it was muffled and coming from the blue and purple box that contained the puppet. Jeremy gulped and prayed that the music box would hold out long enough for him to hide. He heard the animatronics walking around beyond the counter, it sounded like they came close once or twice but with no success. He eventually peered up and saw Freddy standing on the stage, swiveling his head like some kind of oscillating fan. Jeremy assumed it was watching the room, he heard the static noise of the fox somewhere above, but it wasn’t in sight.  _ It must be in the ceiling,  _ Jeremy thought to himself. He picked up a piece of hard candy from one of the buckets behind the prize counter and lobbed it over by a wall. Immediately there was the sound of clanking metal from the ceiling and the panel above where the candy landed practically disappeared as the fox tore it away and launched itself at the sound. It crashed into the ground and untangled itself. Freddy walked over to the fox and lifted the piece of candy, it examined it for a moment before turning its gaze to the prize counter with a sharp whir. It’s stomping footsteps clued to Jeremy that he had been, in fact, discovered. And immediately ran towards the Parts and Service room. The door was fully open, and light spilled into the room illuminating the unmoving figures on the dirty floor. Jeremy reached in just enough to grab the security tablet, then froze when he heard a slight, persistent scraping. He couldn’t see around the wall so he slowly peeked his head in.

A split second later, Jeremy had the tablet in his hands and was running for his life. Behind him clambered another fox animatronic. It was attempting to move as quickly as possible but it’s age and neglect didn’t really make it a huge threat. Except for the sharp hook it had attached on the end of its arm. It’s rusted and shrieking joints drove nails into Jeremy’s ears as he dashed to the office. It was thankfully empty, and the mask had seemingly prevented the animatronics from assaulting the duplicate of himself. He breathed a silent prayer of relief and turned to face the animatronic jogging after him. It’s eyes betrayed an almost rage behind them. Like the approaching robot was...angry. Foxy, that’s what the guy on the phone called it. This one, despite being apparently much older than the Toy animatronics, seemed more alive somehow. The old fox raised its hook and charged at him, faster than it had been able to manage before. Jeremy waited for the right moment, then ducked and rolled to the right towards the vent. He crawled in as fast as he could, but something snagged his pant leg. He turned to look and saw that Foxy had dug his hook into the cuff of his pant leg and started dragging him back. Jeremy struggled and yanked his leg forwards but to no avail. The robotic fox continued to drag him backwards out of the vent. Jeremy heard a strange sounding vibration behind him, it sounded like it was coming from the fox. Was it growling? That thought sent a wave of fear through him, how alive was this thing?

“Stop! Please!” Jeremy cried out, the fox paused for a moment, then continued.

“I know you can hear me!” He shouted at Foxy. It’s eyes narrowed and his mouth opened to speak.

“H...tray...s...ou...wi...tooooooooo.” The speaker stuttered out robotically. The last word trailed off and warped itself into a demonic moaning. Jeremy was nearly clear of the vent, he could see the other animatronics waiting outside. The chicken approached seemingly to assist, but the fox snarled at it. The chicken showed no reaction to the outburst and just turned back. Jeremy glimpsed at the watch Julia had given him, his eyes tested up at the thought that he might not see her again. The fox finally tugged him completely out of the vent and looked down at him. It’s eyes flickered and it’s mouth opened again.

“I...rry.” It spoke and reached out to grab him. Jeremy suddenly twisted and put as much weight as he could on his hooked leg. The abrupt weight on the fox’s arm caused it to come unbalanced and fall forwards. It landed on Jeremy and knocked the breath out of him. He quickly pushed it off of him and stood up. The bunny started approaching him, arms outstretched like it wanted a hug. Jeremy braced himself and charged at the plastic bunny.


	16. Chapter 16

“Ship to the south-west.” Mike said into his headset microphone.

“Not for long.” Foxy growled into his own microphone and ran to the ships wheel.

“Oh but we just got all this nice treasure. I died twice getting that skull!” Chica complained.

“Hey I think I see you guys.” Bonnie said.

“Red flag?” Mike asked.

“Uhh...no.” Bonnie said after a pause.

“Not us, didn’t you say you found a rowboat?” Mike said.

“I did, I also found a shark. I’m not braving these treacherous waters with a rowboat. Not with my little buddies.”

“Leave the damn chickens Bun.” Foxy said turning the ship towards the enemy.

“No and don’t call me that.

“Why can’t we just go pick up Bonnie? We need those chickens and he’s just stuck on that island.” Chica asked.

“Then we’ll be abandoning the score right in front of us! ...and we don’t need those stupid chickens.” Foxy muttered that last part.

“Yes we do Foxy!” Bonnie protested.

“My name is…”

“Oh boy.” Chica groaned.

“The Adventurous Captain Foxy! Terror of the Sea of Thieves!” Foxy shouted.

“Can you guys ke-e-p it down?” Mike faintly heard Freddy call from the headset.

“Sorry Freddy.” Bonnie said.

“So is your first name The?” Mike asked Foxy.

“...no.” Foxy mumbled.

“Is it Adventurous then?” Mike asked.

“Is what adventurous?” Chica asked coming back from checking on Freddy who was doing voice exercises.

“Dammit Mikeal. It’s Captain Foxy, that sorta speak will make you walk the plank.” Foxy grumbled.

“Oh nooo. I’ll just have to bob around in the sea until the siren teleports me back.” Mike fake cried.

“Yer breakin’ the fourth wall landlubber.” Foxy exaggerated his accent.

“There’s no fourth wall  _ Captain _ Foxy. That implies that we’re in a story or something. We’re not, this is real life. Now let’s play some Sea of Thieves.” Mike in the game moved to a cannon and started firing on the other players ship.

“Wait I think I actually see you guys now!” Bonnie exclaimed.

“Red flag?” Chica asked, and started repairing the ships hull.

“I can’t really see it…no. Blue flag.”

“Then it’s not us Bonnie. If they don’t have a red flag then it’s not us.” Chica said exasperated.

“I’m using a cursed cannonball.” Mike said and fired a glowing green cannonball at the enemy.

“What does that one do?” Foxy asked and fired a regular cannonball.

“Makes ‘em all drunk.” Mike smirked and shot at a drunken player with his pistol.

“Nice, wish I could see it.” Bonnie complained. Mike noticed a small notification on the top of his screen that informed him that he just received money. He frowned, then saw another bigger notification on the bottom of his screen, ‘Captains Chest Sold!’ it read.

“Who just sold a chest?” Mike asked, he was hit by a cannonball a second later nearly killing him. He ate a few bananas and was fine.

“Uhh, not me. I’m still on the ship.” Chica said.

“I’m still on the island.” Bonnie said quickly. 

“Arrr, I smell trechery afoot.” Foxy spoke in his accent again.

“Bonnie are you at an outpost?” Mike asked.

“No I’m still on...Wanderers Refuge.” 

“We didn’t leave you on Wanderers Refuge. We left you on Cannon Cove.” Mike was catching on to what happened.

“Did you randomly find a chest just by digging in random places and then took the rowboat to the nearby outpost and tried to sell it for yourself?” 

“...yea.” Bonnie muttered.

“God damn you.” Mike calmly said into the microphone.

“Finish taking down these fools then set course for Cannonball Cove.” Mike ordered. Chica looked over at Bonnie who looked fairly panicked.

“Why?” Chica asked hesitantly.

“Because if I know Bonnie, and I do. He left the chicken coop on the island to keep it from being eaten by sharks. And now it’s unguarded, he’s on a different island with nothing but a rowboat. And we are close enough and I’m angry enough that we all agreed to do it.”

“Aye lass. Seems like the best...and funniest…idea would be to pirate those chickens.” Foxy said to Chica.

“Whatever.” Chica sighed, Mike started slamming cannonballs into the cannon and firing them faster than ever. Soon enough, the ship had enough holes that Mike started throwing fire grenades onto the deck. Absolute chaos ensued, Mike watched their mast fall over, the anchor was accidentally released and their ship did a full 360 in the water. Mike watched their ship sink and the sailors inside struggling in the water. He took a few potshots at them for good measure, then turned to go to the ships map.

“Set course for Cannonball Cove.” Mike said darkly.

A few minutes later, the Flying Fazbear hit the sand of Cannonball Cove. Mike sported Bonnie in the distance, furiously rowing his little boat towards the island making very little progress.

“Alright, let’s pirate these chickens!” Foxy shouted and leapt ashore. Mike followed suit but Chica remained on their galleon type ship.

“Over in the bush!” Mike shouted and picked up the cage of chickens.

“Noooo!” Bonnie screamed, which earned him another glare from Freddy, “My babies!”

“Your children are being held hostage by the terrible crew of the Flying Fazbear!” Foxy called and fired a cannonball over Bonnie's head.

“Je-ez.” Bonnie cried, a small glitch in his voice indicated his system preventing him from cussing. Mike was climbing the ladder to the ship, but when he got to the top the crate was gone.

“What?” He muttered. Bonnie suddenly exclaimed in joy. Mike turned and saw a harpoon gun mounted on the rowboat.

“What! You got a harpoon boat? And you didn’t tell us” Foxy complained and mounted his own ships harpoons.

“No, leave me alone.” Bonnie turned his boat and started rowing away. Foxy carefully aimed the harpoon, then fired it. Bonnie wailed in surprise as his boat was yanked up out of the water and dragged towards the FE Fazbear.

“I caught a big one!” Foxy called and Mike ran over. Bonnie grabbed the chicken coop and jumped off the edge of the ship and started swimming away. Foxy dropped the rowboat and fired again, this time hitting Bonnie and launching him into the galleon.

“To the brig! To the brig! To the brig!” Mike and Foxy starting chanting. They both went into their setting and voted Bonnie to go into the ships jail.

“Come on Chica! We just need your vote.” Foxy pleaded.” Chica rolled her eyes in real life and went still for a moment in the game. Then a notification appeared on the screen.

“BunBun11 has been sent to the brig!” Mike and Foxy giggled and Bonnie groaned.

“Not again guys.” Mike then checked the time.

“Hey, we oughta get back to the outpost and deliver these goods.” He pointed to the chicken coop. Foxy grinned and nodded, “Time to set sail.” Mike and Chica lifted the anchor and Foxy turned the boat westward.

“Angle the sails!” Foxy called. Mike and Chica went to turn the sails to be better filled by the wind. Foxy finished aiming the ship and took out a Hurdy Gurdy, he started playing a lively tune. Mike joined in with a Concertia and Chica with a drum. There was a moments pause, then Bonnie below started playing the banjo. Mike snickered and swayed to the tune of the music. He paused a bit to drink his grog. The went below deck to get more.

“Outpost ahoy!” Foxy called and ran to the wheel. Chica prepared to drop the anchor and Mike drank.

“Drop!” Foxy said sharply and Chica released the anchor. The ship stopped sharply fairly close to the dock and Foxy looked around for the chicken crate.

“Crew mate Mike? Where be the hens?” He asked.

“They’re uhhh...theyre with meeeeeee.” Mike called drunkenly from below and wobbled up the stairs, swaying and running into things. He was carrying the chicken coop and vomiting a lot.

“Come on Mike. Not on duty.” Chica scolded him and dodged his vomit. Mike just saluted and charged off the plank into the water. He swam all the way to the beach carrying the coop and marched right back up into the dock to sell the coop. A few seconds later, a notification appeared on everybody’s screen showing that the chicken coop had been sold.

“Nooooooo!” Bonnie wailed.

“Awww we barely got any money for that.” Foxy grumbled and joined Mike on the island.

“Hold on…someone’s here.” Chica said.

“Where?” Mike asked, drawing his sword drunkenly.

“In the pizzeria.”

“What?” Mike was suddenly sober. “Nobody should be there this late.” Suddenly Foxy, Bonnie, and Chica went silent.

“Guys?” Mike asked. No answer.” He got up and ran to his car parked in the garage.

A little bit later, Mike marched through the unlocked doors of the Pizzaria. He had his weaponized flashlight out and his guard was up. There were two men standing over the four animatronics who appeared disabled or turned off.

“Hey! What are you doing here?” Mike yelled. One man jumped and turned, “Jesus dude, we’re here to transport the robots.” He waved a card and Mike walked closer to look at it.

“When did I order them to be transported?” Mike asked.

“You didn’t. It’s an order from corporate. The new set of robots are running low on parts so they’re scrapping these old hunks of junk to repair the new ones.”

“Hey man, I grew up with these guys. Give them some respect.” The other guy elbowed his partner. His partner glared at him, “Oh cool it. They’re just metal and fake fur, chickens shouldn’t even have fur.” Mike’s eye twitched and he glared at the rude guy.

“Listen. They have more personality then you could ever have...Devon Smith.” Mike addressed the rude guy. Devon glared back and turned to his job.

“Well as long as you’re here, can you help carry these ‘cherished childhood characters’ to the van?” Mike frowned, trying to think of a reason, a problem, any way that he could stop these men from taking away the few friends he had in his life. What would he do without them? Would the restaurant just close? What about the Golden Freddy ghost?

“Well?” The man asked.

“...Sure.”

Mike continued to frown as the doors to the van slammed shut, sealing away his only friends.

“Thanks for the help. What’s gonna happen to this place once these bots are scrapped?” Devon asked Mike. He shook his head, “I have no idea.” Suddenly a banging was heard from inside the truck, as well as a faint, muffled voice.

“Jeez hit the jammer!” Devon shouted, and his friend took out a small remote and pushed a button. There was a crash and the banging stopped.

“Holy shit what was that?” Devon asked.

“Probably just a servo malfunction, one of their arms or something.” His friend replied. Mike glared at him and turned away to go back into the pizzaria.

“ Hope it didn’t break em.” Devon said.

“Who cares? They’re getting scrapped anyways. Did you hear a voice too?” 

“Ugh...what happened?” Bonnie rubbed his head.

“I don’t know, my head is splitting.” Chica replied, “Is this a truck?” Bonnie asked.

“What’s happening? Where are we going?” Foxy asked.

“I-I-I don’t know-ow-ow.” Freddy stuttered, the effects of the device messing with his voice box.

“What about Mike? Is he here?” Bonnie asked.

“I don’t know, but I want answers.” Foxy said angrily and stood up.

“F-Foxy do-don’t.” Freddy said, but Foxy ignored him and pushed on the door. It didn’t budge, so he started banging on it with his good hand.

“Mike! Mikeal?! You there? What’s ha-?” He suddenly froze and collapsed with a crash.

“Foxy!” Bonnie shouted and crawled over to him. The fox didn’t move, just limp.

“He’s turned off.” Bonnie said. Freddy was quiet, staring at the door.

“M-Mike. I heard him-m. He w _ -was _ there.” Freddy said.

“What? Why didn’t he help us?” Chica asked distressed.

“I don’-t-t-t know Chi-ca-ca. I just don’t know.”


	17. Chapter 17

Right on time, the bells chimed. Jeremy had been silently counting down in his head the time until 6 AM after looking at his watch. His charge hit the bunny just as it straightened and lowered its arms. It nearly fell over, having to step back to prevent it from toppling. Jeremy however did fall over, he had bounced off the rabbit like a two year-old tackling a quarterback.

“Ugh.” He groaned from the floor and glanced at the fox. It’s eyes had gone dark and it lay on the floor, it’s arms and legs splayed out like a dropped doll. Jeremy figured that he should carry it back to parts and service, but he figured management would forgive him for not wanting to touch the rusted robot after it had tried to presumably kill him. He stood, brushed himself off, picked up the dummy and removed the mask. He’d come too close to death tonight, there had to be a different way to do this.

Jeremy tiredly unlocked the front doors with his wristband and nodded to Chase who was standing just outside.

“Morning Chase.” He said carting his dummy.

“So it worked huh?” Chase asked, Jeremy noticed bags under his eyes and a tired stance.

“Yea…you get any sleep? Like, at all?” Jeremy asked.

“Not a lot no.” Chase grinned and said. “Don’t worry about me, it’s you you should be worrying about. See ya tonight.” Chase held his hand out and Jeremy shook it.

“See you tonight.” Jeremy said and turned to go to his car.

“Oh! Before I forget.” Jeremy called out to Chase before he went inside. Chase turned and raised an eyebrow.

“Yea?”

“There’s a little...mess left over in the office. Sorry.” Jeremy apologized. Chase laughed, “No worries, I’ll get it taken care of.”

“How was work?” Julia asked when Jeremy walked inside.

“Long, and boring.” He said casually.

“Mmhmm, I got you something by the way.” She tossed him a black cap. Jeremy caught it and looked down at it. It featured the Fazbear Entertainment logo and underneath it, it read ‘security’.

“Where’d you get this?” He asked with a smile.

“Box on our doorstep, from your boss.” She sipped a coffee and checked the clock.

“Boy it’s nearly seven in the morning, you should be in bed.” Julia said fake scolding him, he rolled his eyes and said, “Am I going to get a full days rest today?”.

“Unless I need your discounts or buff puppet bodyguard.” Jeremy snickered at the thought, then wondered if he’d ever see the puppet during work hours. Maybe he’d let the thing out once, what harm could it do? It was confined to the puppeteering machinery above its box.

Later that day, Jeremy woke up to the sounds of cartoonish laughing and sound effects.  _ Lilac must be watching cartoons _ . He thought, and slowly got out of bed. Jeremy stretched his arms and shuffled to the living room/kitchen that made up the main room of the apartment. Lilac was sitting on the couch, blankly staring at the screen.

“Mornin’ Lil.” He said and got out the ingredients for a sandwich. She ignored him and continued to stare at the screen.

“Okay then.” He muttered and spread mayonnaise on the bread. Jeremy heard a clanking from down the hall. He frowned and wondered what his mom was doing that sounded...so… he put down the knife and walked down the hall to his moms room. Just before he got to the door, it burst open. The fox animatronic was there, it had just kicked the door open. Jeremy shouted and turned to run, “Lilac ! Go!” He screamed and ran out of the hall. Then stopped when he heard a choking sound. He turned to look and saw Freddy sitting on his mother’s bed. No, he saw his mother, inside a Freddy Fazbear suit. Her eyes were panicked and blood seeped out from the joints of the suit.

“NO!” Jeremy screamed and ran past Foxy, slammed it against the wall. Jeremy reached the suit and stared helplessly. What was he going to do? He was useless. Useless.

“You’re useless Twitchgerald.” Brian Whiton said and pushed him down onto the dirt. The schoolyard was empty, the kids long gone, except for Jeremy and Brian. School was out, but Brian had dragged Jeremy out to the soccer yard.

“You’re gonna pay.” Brian said and put his foot on Jeremy’s head, pressing it into the packed dirt and grass.

“What did I do?” Jeremy protested through tears.

“You were born loser. Now stop struggling and take your punishment.” Brian kicked his side and his friends laughed.

“Yea, loser. Take it.” One of them laughed and took out his phone to take a picture. Jeremy tried standing up but one of Brian’s friends pushed him back over.

“Stop it!” Jeremy cried out and meekly slapped at the kids leg.

“What was that?” Brian guffawed at Jeremy’s pitiful attempt at rebellion.

“You’re so pathetic Twitchgerald.” Brian hissed at him and pressed his face deeper into the dirt.

“Why don’t you stay in the dirt where you-“ he was interrupted by shouting.

“HEY! Get away from him!” The voice came from an old man dressed in a policeman’s outfit marching towards the bully’s.

“Crap, it’s Black. Go quick.” Brian muttered and ran towards the gap in the fence that led out of the schoolyard.

“Damn kids.” Daniel Black muttered and knelt down by Jeremy.

“You okay kid?” He asked concernedly.

“Y-yea. Thanks.” Jeremy spoke quietly and rolled over to stand up. The school's police officer stood and helped Jeremy up with a surprisingly strong hand.

“I knew those kids were never up to any good.” He said and examined Jeremy’s face.

“You got a cut, I can take you to Nurse Willow. She’s still here and can patch you up. Don’t want that cut to get infected and mess up that pretty face of yours.” Officer Black winked and gestured to the school building.

“Yea sure.” Jeremy said a little more confidently.

“Ms. Willow! I’ve got a patient for you.” Officer Black knocked on the school office door and opened it. A woman in her thirties answered and smiled. Her purse and coat indicated that she was just heading out.

“Who? This one here?” She asked and ruffled Jeremy’s messed up hair.

“What happened? You fall off a fence?” Jess Willow smiled and looked closer at Jeremy’s cut.

“No. That rapscallion Brian Whiton.” Nurse Willow’s light expression darkened immediately and she frowned.

“Heard that name too many times in this room. Come on it, let me clean you up.” Officer Black nudged him in and left the office.

“What’d you do to make Whiton mess with you?” She asked while opening a drawer to grab a clean rag.

“Same thing I always do. Nothing.” Jeremy rubbed his eyes to hide any trace of his tears. Nurse Willie sighed and dampened the rag with warm water to wipe the dirt off his face.

“That boys a menace. Gets it from his mother I’ll bet. You should see the way she acts in school board meetings. I’d say she thinks she’s the principal considering the outlandish suggestions.” She chuckled and grabbed a band-aid and a small tube of neosporin.

“She once brought up the idea of punishing children with below C grades by making them wear a dunce cap. Unfortunately they didn’t allow it other wise you’d see Brian and his cronies wearing one all year.” Jeremy smiled a bit and brushed the hair out of his face so she could see his cut. Nurse Willow applied a small bit of the ointment on the band-aid and gently placed it over Jeremy’s cut.

“Dang, I don’t think you’ll get a good scar out of that one.”

“Ahh my mom would kill me if I got a scar on my face.” Nurse Willow rolled her eyes, “Oh Julia can stuff it. Tell her Jess Willow said scars are cool.” The school nurse smiled and patted his shoulder.

“You’re all set. Knock ‘em dead.” Nurse Willow said and opened the door for him.

“Sorry to keep you late ma’am.” Jeremy apologized.

“Oh it’s not trouble. Just make sure you don’t end up coming back.” She smiled and waved, Jeremy waved back and walked down the hall. Officer Black was standing nearby and grinned when he saw Jeremy.

“Nice. You get a cool scar?” Jeremy smiled and shook his head.

“Oh well, maybe next time.” He laughed and walked with Jeremy through the empty school.

“You make sure if those jerks bother you again, that you let me know. I’ll give ‘em what for.” He patted his taser and winked.

“Thanks Officer Black.” He stepped outside and started walking home, he was surprised when he saw the police officer follow him.

“I’ll walk you home. If I know those kids they’ll be waiting out there for you to come out. I’ll make sure they leave you be for a while.” They walked in silence for a bit before Jeremy pointed out his house.

“Don’t live too far huh? That’s nice, me and the missus are all the way downtown.” Jeremy nodded, not really knowing what to say.

“Yep, there they are.” Officer Black pointed out a bush near Jeremy’s house where they could hear arguing. Officer Black snuck up to the bush and took out his taser.

“You’re dead mea-oh crap!” Brian jumped out from behind the bush and almost fell over backwards when he saw the elderly officer with his taser out. Daniel Black sparked his taser with a loud crackling. Brian almost gave himself whiplash turning around and running. His two friends followed suit running like their lives depended on it. Jeremy busted out laughing as well as Officer Black.

“That was...amazing.” Jeremy spoke through bouts of laughter. The old man chuckled along with him.

“Well they’ll leave you along for a bit I’ll reckon. You get home to your momma.” Jeremy’s smiled died and he nodded.

“See ya kid.” Officer Black nodded to him and went back to the school. _Back to my mom._ _Not likely._ Jeremy thought, and walked up the steps to his front door.


	18. Chapter 18

Jeremy awoke in a cold sweat, his face was flushed and breathing hard. He closed his eyes and calmed down. It had just been a dream, and a memory? It had been a while since he’d consciously thought of Brian Whiton. His junior high school bully, Jeremy absently rubbed his neck and got out of bed. He heard faint chatting in the living room, his mom and Lilac most likely. He walked down the hall and waved at them. They were seated on the couch and sounded like they were discussing the subject of some book Lilac was reading for school.

“Hey Jeremy, so what were you saying Lil?” Julia asked.

“It’s about all these kids who got stranded on an island and there’s a weird creature. Their government is almost as dysfunctional as ours is.” Lilac went on about the contents of the book while Jeremy made himself a sandwich.

“What do you think is the underlying message behind the book?” Julia asked Lilac .

“Don’t make a stupid government when you’re stranded and find a way off instead.” Lilac said and kissed Julia on the cheek.

“Good enough. Hey Jeremy?” Julia turned to face him.

“I figured out your school situation. I’ll have you doing an online school. You can work on assignments at your job and during the day if you can. I asked the teachers and they all think that you could get most of them done on your phone. The other ones they can accommodate something else.” Jeremy listened, then nodded when she finished.

“That sounds good.” Internally he was screaming. Homework on top of life or death situation?

“Doesn’t sound like  _ home _ work anymore. Now it sounds like workwork.” Lilac said and cracked up. Julia giggled a little and hugged Lilac .

“You little monster.”

That night, Jeremy packed the dummy into his backseat and got ready to drive to work. He was alert for the most part and ready for the night...for the most part. He’d developed a strategy for tonight. It would be incredibly risky and a little stupid. But luck had gotten him this far, he hoped it would carry him farther. He saw Julia tiredly wave to him as he pulled out. Jeremy smiled and waved back. He tried not to think about what it would do to her and Lilac if he messed up tonight. That was reason enough to survive, on top of self preservation, never finishing his big game idea, and not having been to Ireland yet. Jeremy sighed, then took a deep breath. It was time to kick robot ass, again.

Jeremy pulled into the now familiar parking lot of Freddy Fazbear Restaurant and Arcade. Chase’s car was the only one besides Jeremy’s in the parking lot. Giving the place an abandoned feel if it’s lights weren’t blazing. Jeremy got out of the car and carried with him the dummy as well as a screwdriver. Chase was waiting by the doors with a nervous expression.

“Hey Jeremy.” He greeted Jeremy when he walked in.

“Hey Chase, you okay?” Jeremy asked.

“Yea, yea. Just a little incident happened today.” Chase looked around the parking lot. Jeremy frowned and immediately wondered if an animatronic had harmed a kid.

“Was everything okay?”

“Of course. There was just some man prowling around outside the restaurant. Our day shift guard noticed him and stood near the doors so he wouldn’t try anything.” Jeremy nodded in appreciation.

“Smart guy...or gal.” Jeremy corrected himself.

“Smart person.” Chase smiled. “But it’s okay, they wouldn’t mind. They’re a very good guard and have worked here longer than anybody.”

“Cool. Maybe I’ll meet them sometime.” Jeremy pointed to the hallway to the office.

“Did you get Foxy back?” He asked nervously. Chase laughed, “Yea we did. You should’ve seen the look on the openers this morning when I told them to help me carry Foxy back to parts and service. I think one of them almost cried.” They shared a laugh and Jeremy sighed.

“Well I better get to work. I’m hoping for a nice, boring night. But not expecting it.” Chase nodded.

“Yea, you keep away from those things. Especially that puppet, something’s different about it. I can’t put my finger on it.”

“Definitely. I’ll keep my distance.” Jeremy smiled and waved half-heartedly.

“See ya in the morning.” Jeremy said and walked into the brightly lit building.

“See ya.” Chase murmured and watched him go.

Jeremy quickly made his way to the office, clutching his screwdriver and the Jeremy Junior dummy. He looked up at the ceiling as he went, mapping out routes and exits mentally. He heard a creak a ways away and he turned to look towards it. The lid to the puppets box closed quickly. Jeremy shuddered, if that thing could move around before the night started...he didn’t want to think about it. 

The office was exactly how he’d left it before minus one fox robot. Jeremy started by setting up the Jeremy Junior doll. He’d reinforced it with some metal rods on the inside instead of coat hangers. The doll should be able to support the Freddy mask. A fact which Jeremy proved by placing the empty head on top of the dressed up doll. He’d decided that it would be better to wear clothes he could run in instead of the uniform. He’d put on a pair of basketball shorts and an athletic shirt. The doll wore his blue polo shirt and black khakis, Jeremy wore the embroidered hat just in case. He climbed up onto the desk and examined the vent just above his head. It could be taken off pretty quickly, it just needed the flat end of his screwdriver. Jeremy started unscrewing the vent and almost fell over at the abrupt sound of the buildings main lights shutting off. A few seconds later, the phone started ringing. Jeremy continued removing the vent while the recording played.

“Hello hello! See? I told you you wouldn't have any problems!

Did...uh... Did Foxy ever appear in the hallway? Probably not. I was just curious. Like I said, he was always my favorite. They tried to remake Foxy, ya know? Uh, they thought the first one was too scary, so they redesigned him to be more kid-friendly and put him in Kid's Cove. To keep the toddlers entertained, you know... But kids these days just can't keep their hands to themselves. The staff literally has to put Foxy back together after every shift. So eventually they stopped trying and left him as some 'take apart and put back together' attraction. Now he's just a mess of parts. I think the employees refer to him as just "’The Mangle.’ “

Jeremy frowned, he was certain that Spider Fox Freak had been feminine for some reason. Male made sense now but so did female for some reason. He finally removed the vent and jumped down onto the floor to finish listening to the call.

“Uh...Oh, hey, before I go, uh, I wanted to ease your mind about any rumors you might have heard lately. You know how these local stories come and go and seldom mean anything. I can personally assure you that, whatever is going on out there, and however tragic it may be, has nothing to do with our establishment. It's just all rumor and speculation... People trying to make a buck. You know... Uh, our guard during the day has reported nothing unusual. And he's on watch from opening til close.

Okay, well anyway, hang in there and I'll talk to you tomorrow” Jeremy took in the contents of the call. Those rumors, he’d have assumed they’d be talking about the robots moving around at night. But he said the day shift guard had reported nothing unusual. Was he just misdirecting? Lying? What would happen during the day that sparked rumors? Jeremy decided to focus on answers later, after he slept in the morning.

“I don’t need answers, I need sleep.” He muttered and climbed up into the vents.

Not long after, Jeremy heard the familiar clanging of approaching doom from the hallway. He watched through the open vent, figuring it wouldn’t realize he was inside the vents. From what he could see, it was the old bunny robot. Old Bonnie he mentally named it. Old Bonnie slowly toddled forwards until it reached the desk. Counting its ears, the bunny was quite tall. Jeremy watched it look close at the doll, then shudder for a second and turn away. Jeremy then heard metallic, hollow thudding. One of them was in the vents below, Toy Freddy it turned out. Jeremy held his breath, he knew what was about to come next. Toy Freddy shook for a moment, then turn and walk down the hall. Jeremy barely held back a snigger at how dumb it looked. He had time, he could watch the robots wander in and out.


	19. Chapter 19

Jeremy was seriously regretting not bringing any entertainment. His phone was on the desk, and he didn’t want to risk his life just to read. Toy Chica clambered out of a vent and did the same routine she’d done for the last hour. Stare at the dummy and shake, Jeremy glared at her and sighed mentally.  _ Morons, all of them.  _ He thought, some animatronic started clanking loudly down the hallway. He waited to see who it was, it didn’t sound like a toy animatronic. Foxy appeared at the door then froze, it looked around, then walked up to the dummy and yanked the mask off. Jeremy’s eyes bulged, that wasn’t supposed to happen.

“Stu...sk...ool...e...uard.” Foxy stuttered out and glanced around. The shrinking of his metal joints driving nails into Jeremy’s ears. He slowly crawled back into the vent, out of sight. After a minute, he heard retreating metal footsteps. Jeremy peeked out again and saw the empty office. He nearly leapt out of his skin when he heard his phone ring. He squinted to see who was calling him and was surprised to see it was his mother. He quickly climbed down, snatched the phone and threw himself back up into the vent. The only reason she would call is if there was some sort of emergency. And if he didn’t answer, she would get worried and come to Freddy’s. And he wouldn’t risk that.

“Hello?” He answered.

“Hey Jer-Bear it’s mom.”

“What’s wrong? Why are you calling?” Jeremy whispered into the phone, trying to keep his voice from echoing through the vents and revealing his position.

“Nothing, I just got worried and couldn’t sleep. Are you alright? You’re talking rather quietly.” She sounded concerned.

“I’m fine.” Jeremy reassured her. “It’s just kinda spooky here, I want to keep my voice down.”

“Oh…kay…how’s work going?” Julia asked.

“Fine, just uh…” Jeremy stiffened as he heard the Mangle’s static coming from the hallway below. “Just fine...I’m fine.” He said awkwardly.

“You don’t sound fine, you sound stressed.” Julia frowned.

“I am, just long nights.” Jeremy said as Mangle climbed into the office and looked down at the discarded dummy. The metal contraption was nearly right below him.

“Okay, all that homework probably isn’t helping huh?” Julia asked. Jeremy’s eyes widened and suddenly remembered the pages of homework in his car.

“Y-yea. It’s not too difficult though.” Jeremy mentally facepalmed as Mangle dropped down onto the dummy with a crash and pinned it down.

“What was that?” Julia asked.

“Oh, just something falling over.” Jeremy watched Mangle lift the dummy, and examine it. Toy Freddy and Toy Bonnie appeared as well.

“Sounded expensive.” Julia said.

“Not really, just a pile of scrap.” Toy Freddy’s ears twitched and it look up, making eye contact with Jeremy.

“Dammit.” He cursed and started crawling through the vents.

“Huh? I didn’t hear you.”

“Nothing. Just talking to myself.” He tried his best to avoid screws and bits of metal sticking out, but he still scratched himself a few times.

“Okay. What kind of school work are you doing?” She asked.

“Uhh math. It’s algebra.” Jeremy turned a corner and almost got a new haircut from a fan blocking the way. He backed up and went the other way.

“I  _ hated _ algebra, let me tell you. I still haven’t used it outside of school.”

“Yea, I’ll bet.” Jeremy said distractedly.

“You kind of sound out of breath. Are you running?” Julia asked.

“Yea I’m uh...exercising.” He winced at how lame the lie sounded, a distant thumping told him that an animatronic entered the vent. Mangle from the sound of the static.

“Oh that’s a good idea...what’s that static?”

“Just my radio, why so many questions mom?”

“I’m just curious about the place that’s all. They gave you a radio? Who are you supposed to talk to?”

“Uhh, I’m not sure.” Jeremy could practically hear Julia’s eyes rolling.

“Whatever.” Julia said dramatically. Jeremy found a vent that led down into some empty room. There was a slumped figure in the corner, by the look of the bunny ears it was an animatronic. So he just kept crawling.

“I love you Jer-bear.” Julia said.

“I love you too mom.” He said out of breath. He found the vent that led back into the office, peeking down he saw Toy Freddy waiting by the hallway. And from the scuffling sounds in the vents, he guessed that that Toy Bonnie and Toy Chica we’re guarding those too. The static echoing through the vents intensified and the metal clanging grew closer. Jeremy closed his eyes for a brief second, then put his phone in his pocket and jumped down. Immediately Toy Freddy started lumbering towards him. Jeremy waited until it got close, and threw an empty paper cup at it. Toy Freddy pauses and gave Jeremy enough time to dash around him and run. He lifted the phone back up to his ear to listen to him mom talking.

“-rt going to the gym in the mornings.” She was saying.

“Yea you should.” Jeremy was breathing heavily. He opened the door to Parts and Service, checking to make sure it was actually empty this time. He nearly dashed back out before realizing the large yellow lump in the corner was an empty suit. It was some sort of faded yellow Freddy duplicate, Jeremy could see the inside of its head through its eyes. He went in and shut the door, barricading it with a long metal pole and piling chunks of metal against it.

“It’s about time I started caring about my body image.” Julia said bitterly.

He breathed a sigh of relief and cursed that breath when he heard banging on the door. His eyes darted up to the vent cover, his only hope of escape.

“What’s that banging? Why are there so many weird noises at your work?” He took the screwdriver out of his pocket and furiously started unscrewing. 

“I don’t know, there just is.” Jeremy said.

The banging sounds behind him intensified, the metal starting to give. He took the final screw off and tossed the vent cover down. Then paled when he heard static, from the vent ahead. Metal clanging told him that Mangle was crawling through the vents, and he’d bet all his money that he was coming for him. Jeremy jumped down and looked around, there was no other escape from the room...except...

“Hey mom? I have to go.”

“Oh...okay well I’ll see you in-“

“Bye mom.” He abruptly said and hung up.

Nowhere to escape, but somewhere to hide. Jeremy wiped his palms on his pants then approached the empty Freddy suit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, haven’t talked to y’all in a while. First of all the support I’ve gotten from you guys is absolute amazing. Thank you all so much. Second of all I’m rubbing it in your faces that I’ve just written a super emotionally devastating chapter that I’m super excited to get to. I’ve managed to keep ahead on my chapters and I’ve almost reached the end on mine. Get ready for a real astounding ending.


	20. Chapter 20

Jeremy quickly looked over the empty exosuit. It had clamps that attached the torso to the waist that looked like they were supposed to be release. Jeremy struggled with them for a second before unclasping them and separating the torso from the waist. He quickly stuck his legs through the empty space inside. It seemed the suit was made to be worn by a person. Jeremy noticed the springlocks along the inside of the suit. If they were released, they would likely reassemble the endoskeleton right where he would be. Jeremy disregarded them and wiggled into the torso of the Freddy exosuit. The inside stank like roadkill and had a weird stain by the mouth like someone had tried to eat a pizza while wearing it. He just tried to ignore the smell and crossed his arms over his chest. The torso was big enough that he didn’t need to insert his arms into the suits arms. He adjusted the legs and was horrified to find that the clamps automatically latched closed, trapping him inside the suit. 

Right on cue, the door burst open scattering the metal all over the floor. Toy Bonnie walked in with its unsettling gait, followed by Toy Freddy and Toy Chica. Jeremy shifted to watch where they would go. They all looked around the room, Toy Bonnie lingering by the door. Then Toy Freddy looked up at the open vent cover, he was immediately imitated by the other two. Jeremy heard a static screeching and metal clanging and Mangle barged through the vents in search of Jeremy. A minute later, Mangle climbed out of the vent and hung from it with a bare arm. They all started looking around the room, then Mangle locked eyes with Jeremy in the suit. He closed them, but it was too late. 

He heard Toy Freddy lumbered over and opened his eyes to see what was happening. Toy Freddy reached for the head of the suit. Then stopped, and stood up. Jeremy started at the bear as it reached towards him again, then stopped. Toy Freddy stepped away and Toy Chica approached this time. The same thing happened, Mangle climbed back into the vent and left. Toy Freddy finally just walked out the door. Jeremy didn’t move for a long time, he finally got the nerve to tilt his head to look towards the door. There was a loud SNAP! And the left arm jolted, Jeremy froze and looked down at it without moving his head. The arm was now filled with the endoskeleton, the pieces fitted together by the opening of the springlock. Jeremy rested his head against the back of the suits head, it was gonna be a long shift.

An hour later, Jeremy had mumble-sung a few songs, carved his name into the soft insulation of the suit with a pencil he had, and written a paragraph-long word of advice for anyone else trapped in the suit in the future. He clicked his tongue for a bit before sighing. In the distance the bells chimed, and the clattering and scraping that had been going on for the last hour ceased. Jeremy cheered and suddenly remembered that he was stuck, he’d have to wait until Chase came and hopefully decided to check this room.  _ Actually,  _ Jeremy thought,  _ if he couldn’t find me, the inside of a suit would be the first place he’d look. _ He hoped he wouldn’t give him too much of a scare. Strangely enough, about a minute later Chase jogged into the parts and service room and gasped at the suit on the floor.

“By God Jeremy don’t move.” Chase said. Jeremy rolled his eyes and watched as Chase shakily undid the clamps sealing Jeremy in the suit. The boy wriggled out as carefully as he could.

“Morning Chase.” He said cheerily.

“How in the hell? What came over you to hide in that THING!?” Chase yelled. Jeremy blanched and got scared all of a sudden.

“It’s f-fine, I’m fine. I was pinned d-down here I couldn’t get out!” Jeremy stuttered a little bit from the stress. 

“I know I know.” Chase just sighed and put his face in his hands.

“Don’t scare me like that.” He said and groaned.

“Sorry I-...wait, what do you mean you know?” Jeremy asked.

“Don’t worry about it.” Chase smiled and picked up Jeremy’s hat that had fallen off. Jeremy took it and put it on, “Better go get my duplicate.” Jeremy said and walked out of the dark room to the office. It was absolute chaos, the old clothes and rags that he had used to stuff the dummy were strewn about the room. The dummy itself was ripped in half and brutally shoved into a spare Freddy suit. Jeremy opened the suit the same way he did the other one and tried pulling the suit off. It was stuck on the cloth though.

“You need to release the springlocks. They’re attaching the suit to the dummy” Chase said and stick his hand into the neck opening of the head and flipped a switch quickly pulling his hand out. There was a slow clicking and the exosuit started sagging. The head came off easily then and revealed the tattered remains of the cloth dummy’s head. There wasn’t much left behind, Jeremy pulled the rest out through the neck and left the suit on the floor.

“Jeez, it tore this apart.” Jeremy said and walked whistled.

“Yea it sure did, and that suit you were casually sitting in would’ve done worse.” Chase gritted his teeth at the sight.

“Really? Well I guess I need a new uniform. A few patches won’t cover this up?” He held up the shredded shirt and pants and Chase sighed.

“There’s a spare uniform in that locker. Might not fit though.” Chase gestured at the locker and rubbed his eyes. Jeremy yawned and stretched his arms.

“Well I...better get going.” He said through his yawn and walked over to the locker. Inside there was a spare flashlight, a few batteries, and a uniform on a hanger. Jeremy pulled the uniform on over his clothes and walked out of the office.

“See ya Chase!” He called and heard a faint reply. He looked and saw Chase slumped over the table asleep. Jeremy frowned then kept walked away,  _ why had he been so tired recently? _ Jeremy thought, he peeked in the Parts and Service door to see the disabled old animatronics.

“Huh?” He said aloud and stared at the empty spot where the yellow Freddy suit was just a minute ago.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohhh boy, hope y’all enjoyed this one. Where I’m at writing wise in the story is pretty close to the end, I’m really excited for the end of this one. Cause then not only will I get a friggin break. But I’ll be able to start getting serious about what might be my favorite part of the series, FNaF 3. Get excited. Now.


	21. Chapter 21

“Hey Chase?” Jeremy called down the hallway.

Chase just mumbled and waved a hand. Jeremy sighed and just walked towards the front doors. He’d leave the man to sleep, but tomorrow night this security guard would have questions. The eerie silence of the pizzaria no longer bothered Jeremy. He knew the silence wasn’t even the worst thing, between the puppet and that disappearing Freddy suit, a little quiet didn’t hurt anybody. Jeremy walked over to the box that contained the puppet. All throughout the night he’d been winding up that stupid box, now it played softly, kept wound by the building until it was time for it to wake up. Jeremy wondered how it knew the difference between waking up at day versus night. Most likely it just had an internal clock or timer that told it. Jeremy hesitantly reached out and lifted the lid of the box. The puppet was curled up inside in the fetal position. It’s eyes were dark and it’s body still, a quiet jingle played from a small box connected to the side of the bigger box. Jeremy couldn’t put a finger on the tune, something familiar. He lowered the lid and turned away from it.

The man had watched her, it could not see his face but it knew that it was intruding. Despite her best efforts, the mindless ones had not captured him yet. The soulful ones had not helped much, but they would tonight. The fox was very useful in its anger, it would kill the man despite it not being the one who betrayed it. Even the soulful ones were just puppets to be controlled. She couldn’t tell them what to do directly like with the mindless ones, but she had her ways. All that she had left was time, her death would not go unavenged.

Jeremy turned the parking brake on and put the car in park. Rubbing his eyes he opened the door to see Julia waiting right next to the car.

“Uhh, hey Julia.” Jeremy said and her eyes narrowed.

“What’s going on there?” She asked accusingly.

“The entire night I’ve been worried sick about you with all the weird noises and you acting weird and the whole hanging up on me all of a sudden. What’s happening?” Jeremy gulped and desperately thought of a way out of it.

“I uhhh...it’s…”

“Are there other people there?” She asked with a glare.

“N-...yea there are.” Jeremy said, pretending to be dejected at his lie. He was actually thrilled to have an excuse for his weird behavior.

“Didn’t you say there wasn’t anybody else there? Are you just playing around instead of doing homework?”

“I never said that.” Jeremy said, confused.

“I’m pretty sure you did. Alright, from now on I want to hear about  _ everything _ that goes on there.” Julia said and poked his chest.

“Everything.” Jeremy promised and hugged her. She grumbled but hugged him back, “Shower, then go to bed. You stink.”

Jeremy woke an hour later, he felt energetic and needed to let some steam out. He walked into the kitchen and saw Lilac at a computer working on homework.

“Hey Lil, doing school?” She turned quickly and smiled widely when she saw Jeremy.

“Jeremy! You’ve been gone forever and ever!” She screamed and ran over to hug him.

“Feels like it.” Jeremy said and hugged her back tightly.

“Go back to working on your homework. I don’t want you to get behind.” Jeremy let her go but she continued to hold on.

“Homework stinks. I don’t want to.” Lilac crinkled her nose.

“It does stink and I don’t want to get political about it but it’s overall pointless and a waste of time. The school system doesn’t need to cram education that probably won’t be used in our future during every second of our out of school lives.”

Lilac looked up at him blankly and Jeremy sighed.

“Homework sucks but you have to do it.” Jeremy summed up. Lilac nodded solemnly and reluctantly let Jeremy go.

“Just this once.” She promised and sat back down. Jeremy grinned and opened the pantry to grab ingredients for a sandwich. He had to reach around several items to reach the peanut butter in the back. Jeremy was the only one in the house not allergic to peanuts, so both Julia and Lilac strived to hide it in the back whenever they could. After a moment, he changed his mind and put the peanut butter back. He was in the mood for a ham and cheese. Jeremy grabbed the ingredients, making sure to apply an absurd amount of mayo just how he liked it and set it on the table. He sat down in the chair and tried to ignore his mother scolding him.

“At least try to connect with her.” Julia said exasperatedly. Jeremy sullenly looked away and out the window. Lilac sat on the lawn, picking at the freshly mowed grass.

“She just ignores me Julia. I can’t do anything with her if she refuses to talk to me or even acknowledge me.” Julia sat down next to Jeremy on the couch.

“Sometimes making friends is difficult. I mean you’ve managed to befriend nearly the entire staff at your school.”

“That’s just because of Officer Black.” Jeremy grumbled.

“He’s friendly with everyone so everyone is nice around him.”

“But weren’t you and Mr. Langford talking about videogames for almost half an hour while I was waiting to pick you up? Officer Black wasn’t there then.” Jeremy winced.

“I said I’m sorry. I didn’t see your car.” Julia raised her hands.

“That’s not the issue. The issue is that you’re ignoring your sister.”

“She’s not my sister.” Jeremy snapped, Julia’s expression turned hard. She turned away from Jeremy and walked to her room slamming the door. Jeremy immediately felt bad but didn’t regret what he said. He didn’t care what the adoption papers said, that silent girl was  _ not _ his sister.

“Jeremy?” Lilac said concernedly.

“You okay?” Jeremy startled awake and looked over at his younger sister.

“Y-yea I’m fine. Just tired.” Jeremy said and rubbed his eyes.  _ So much for energy _ , he thought.

“You were mumbling something.” Lilac looked bothered. Jeremy couldn’t remember what he was thinking about, he just waved it off.

“Oh it was probably nothing.” Lilac frowned then turned back to her computer. Jeremy turned back to his sandwich, he wasn’t very hungry all of a sudden. He push it away and stood up, he’d go for a walk to clear his mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s gonna start getting down and dirty so start paying attention. Remember, comments are more useful to me than Kudos but both are appreciated!


	22. Chapter 22

Lilac watched her brother get dressed to go on his walk.  _ Why did he say she’s not my sister? _ Lilac thought gloomily, she wasn’t stupid, she knew about the adoption papers. But she thought they’d gotten past that, that Jeremy considered her his little sister. Was he okay? Lilac finished her homework and turned the computer off. She walked over to where the cradle phone was and dialed Julia’s number.

“Hello?” She answered.

“Mom?”

“Lilac honey? Are you alright?” She was immediately concerned, a clatter told Lilac that something was just set down on Julia’s end.

“I’m fine mom. But I’m worried about Jeremy.” Julia breathed a sigh of relief.

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“He fell asleep at the table just now.” Lilac said and looked over at Jeremy’s sandwich. She was kinda hungry.

“Well he is working late you know…”Julia said starting to lose her attentiveness. Someone yelled over on Julia’s end and she covered the phone to respond.

“But he said something. He said, ‘She’s not my sister’.” Julia’s breath caught and she was quiet for a moment.

“Oh dear.” She said.

“Why do you think he said it mom?” Lilac asked.

“I-...I don’t know honey. He may have been having a bad dream.” Lilac nodded.

“Okay.” There was a quiet, the Julia spoke.

“I need to go honey. Have you eaten lunch?”

“Not yet. I’m about to.” Lilac said glancing towards the sandwich Jeremy left.

“Okay good. Bye, I love you.”

“I love you too mom.” Lilac said and hung up.

Jeremy’s stomach groaned as he walked up the steps to the apartment. The walk had quickly made him realize how hungry he was. He had decided to jog past Freddy’s, a decision he quickly regretted. The smell of the food practically made his stomach crawl out of his body and beg for food. He had seen a man sitting on a bench outside, occasionally glancing towards the windows. The man wore a grey suit jacket and black pants. He had some weird thing around his neck like a necklace or something. Jeremy had walked to the front doors and got as close a look at him as he could. The man looked like he hadn’t shaved in a week, the beginnings of a beard covered his chin. His eyes glinted when he looked at Jeremy. The man had done nothing, and Jeremy had just walked into Freddy’s. The smell of food growing even more intense. Jeremy walked until he found Chase practically asleep in the wooden chair at the security office desk.

“Hey Chase?” Jeremy said. Chase snorted and opened his eyes.

“Oh hey Jeremy.” Chase said groggily.

“Remember that guy you told me about? Well I think I saw him outside.” Chase nodded and sighed.

“Tell the puppet.” He said and closed his eyes again. Jeremy stared for a moment before realizing he wasn’t kidding.

“You’ve got to be kidding.” Chase just grunted in response and waved Jeremy away. Jeremy turned around and walked shakily down the hallway. He needed to react quickly, but he  _ really _ didn’t want to talk to the puppet. Jeremy squeezed between two kids and dodged a toddler running from his parent.

“Wow! You’ve won 48 tickets!” The puppets voice seemed to rise above the general noise. Echoing through the room menacingly. Jeremy watched it dispense a handful of tickets to a sullen looking teenager. He waited for the teenager to walk away, then approached the puppet and looked at it cautiously.

“Hello...Mister Fitzgerald. What can I do for you?” It asked in its prerecorded voice.

“There’s...uh...someone outside.” Jeremy said and gestured at the doorway. He couldn’t see the man from where he stood but the way a woman and her daughter walked in told him that he was still creeping on the bench.

“Are they a threat?” The puppet asked, it’s voice was no longer loud but quiet enough for Jeremy to barely hear it.

“I don’t...think so. They just look...shady.” Jeremy winced at how lame it sounded. The puppet nodded and watched the doorway.

“I will make sure they do not enter. Thank you for bringing this to my attention.” The puppet went silent and watched the doorway. Jeremy heard an inconsistent ticking coming from the puppet. He wondered breifly if it was broken or something, then just turned to go. He was absolutely starving, hopefully the mayo on his sandwich wasn’t gross by now.

Lilac cautiously spread jelly over the slice of bread. She didn’t know if her big brother would be fooled by her imitation of his sandwich but she didn’t want to get in trouble. The jiggling of the doorknob told her that he was home, and she only had a few seconds to react. She hurriedly scooped peanut butter off the bottom of the plastic jar and quickly spread it on the bread. In her panic she didn’t realize that she got a small bit on her hand from the rim. She quickly put the sandwich on the same napkin as Jeremy’s old sandwich and was in the middle of putting the ingredients away when Jeremy walked into the kitchen.

“Hey, whatcha doin?” He asked, taking his shoes off.

“Oh...you left your sandwich stuff out. She said while putting the jam away. Jeremy nodded, then glanced at the messily made sandwich on the table.

“Did you eat my sandwich?” He wasn’t accusing her, but he was a little bothered.

“No. Why would I do that?” She asked inoocently and wiped her nose.

“Well I’m not sure how my ham and cheese turned into a PB and J… Lilac your face!” Jeremy suddenly noticed the peanut butter on her hand and face from where she had wiped it. She frowned, then gently touched her face where the peanut butter was. Jeremy grabbed a towel and ran over to her to wipe the goopy peanut butter off her face. She was just frozen in shock, her hand starting to go red. Jeremy tried to get as much of it off as possible but it was starting to smear. Lilac started coughing and breathing raspily.

“Epi-pen! Where is it?”

“M-Mom...has…” Lilacs eyes rolled into the back of her head and she collapsed.

“SHIT!” Jeremy swore and whipped his phone out to call the police.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many of the few of you are probably wondering why this chapter has come out. Well a fan of the series somehow found me on a discord community chat and we had a nice talk. I felt like giving you guys a bit of a treat, so enjoy!
> 
> It won’t be this happy for very long...

The paramedics arrived quickly, immediately injecting Lilac with an epi-pen stopping the swelling from worsening. Her breathing was painful to listen to and her face was so red.

“Is she going to be okay?” Jeremy asked. A nearby paramedic nodded.

“Of course, it  _ was _ just an allergic reaction. The swelling will go down, just keep an eye on her and keep her drinking fluids.” The dark haired woman said.

“Ruby! Let’s go!” A man yelled. And she jogged to the ambulance. Jeremy watched them drive away then walked into the house to go watch Lilac. She was laying in bed, the swelling still fairly high.

“Need anything?” Jeremy asked, laying the back of his hand on her forehead. She mumbled something quietly so Jeremy leaned down to her face to hear her better.

“Peanut butter and jelly sandwich.” She whispered, then grinned faintly. Jeremy rolled his eyes, then heard a frantic unlocking of the front door and then quick footsteps.

“Lilac?! Jeremy?!” Julia shouted.

“Up here mom!” Jeremy called and a split second later Julia Fitzgerald was at Lilacs side comforting her and scolding her at the same time. Jeremy just backed away and let her mother his little sister. He sat down at the table and sullenly looked up at Julia sitting across from him. He refused to look at Lilac sitting next to him.

“So how was your guy’s days?” Julia asked straining to maintain a pleasant voice. Both kids remained silent, the only sound was the clacking of silverware against plates as they ate dinner.

“Jeremy, Lilac. You guys are eventually going to have to talk to each other.” Jeremy sneered down at his plate and stabbed another stalk of asparagus.

“I saw that.” Julia scolded, but did nothing about it. There was silence around the table before Lilac slowly pushed her untouched plate away from her and stood up.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Julia demanded. Lilac ignored her and walked over to the window to begin her usual staring out the window until the sun went down. Julia just sighed and looked over at Jeremy.

“What am I going to do with her?” She asked more to herself than everybody else.

“Give her back.” Jeremy mumbled under his breath. Julia’s wandering gaze snapped back to him and her breath caught. She tried to keep her composure but a tear eventually escaped and slid down her cheek. Jeremy was startled when he saw the tear, he didn’t mean to make her cry. Nonetheless, Julia stood up and quickly walked to her bedroom where Jeremy could faintly hear her sobbing. He looked down and saw his warped expression in the plate, then looked away in disgust.

Jeremy lifted his head slowly, his skin slightly sticking to the wood. It was 10:20, the faint clacking of keys told him that Julia was working on the borrowed computer. Lilac had to be in bed by now. Jeremy got up, a cramp developing in his shoulder, and walked to his moms room. Her face was illuminated by the glow of the screen, she looked tired and beaten.

“Hey mom.” Jeremy said quietly as to make sure Lilac slept. Julia jumped and closed the tab she was on, then turned and smiled.

“Hey Jer-bear. How was your nap?” She pulled out her phone and showed him a picture of his face planted on the table. Jeremy rolled his eyes, “It was fine thank you very much.” He nodded at the computer.

“What’re you working on?” He asked.

“Oh nothing.” She smiled. Jeremy could obviously tell she was lying so he left the topic alone.

“Alright, well I’m gonna go to bed then.”

“Need me to clear off the table first?” She grinned wickedly. Jeremy lightly hit her arm, then hugged her. She hugged him back and smacked his head.

“That’s for hitting me so hard.” Jeremy rolled his eyes and left the room.

“Goodnight.” He called behind him.

“Night.” His mom replied.

Later that night, Jeremy stared up at the ceiling and wondered how in the living hell he was supposed to survive tonight. His dummy was gone, the vents were a no go due to Mangle. The office was a death trap, and apparently he’d hidden inside a ghost the last night. He didn’t know what was up with that yellow Freddy costume. But it wasn’t something he wanted to mess with ever again. Jeremy got up and looked through a moving box that hadn’t been unpacked just yet. Inside was an engraved folding pocket knife. He rubbed the familiar words, ‘Don’t forget who you are Jeremy.’ inscribed on the polished wooden handle. His father had given it to him, he hadn’t thought about his dad in ages. And there was a reason, he pushed the memories away from him and stood up. He knew that the knife would do absolutely nothing against the metal monstrosities, but having it with him made him feel safer. It was nearly 11:15, the time that he usually started getting ready for work. There had to be something he could do to prepare. He looked all around him, but there wasn’t anything that could remotely help him.  _ Tonight might be my last,  _ Jeremy thought.


	24. Chapter 24

Jeremy parked the car and sat back. He was wracked with anxiety, he had tonight and tomorrow night to prove that he was a decent guard. After that, what was he supposed to do? Continue to risk his life for a meager paycheck? The image of his mother just hours ago, her tired and worn face filled him with determination. He  _ had _ to survive, he  _ had _ to help support his mother, he looked over at the seat next to him and groaned. And he had to do trigonometry all the while. Chase knocked on the window gently and waved, Jeremy rolled the window down and smiled despite the fear lodged in the pit of his stomach.

“Hey Jeremy, tonight's all ready for you. I uh...worked on a little something for you. You’ll see it when you get to the office, it’s a gift from a friend.The radio won’t really help you but...well I’ll let you decide how to use it.” Chase said. He fidgeted with his hands for a moment before nodding awkwardly, “You’ll need it more than I do.” He stepped away from the door to allow Jeremy to get out. The boy opened the door and hugged Chase. The man’s eyes went wide and he nervously patted Jeremy’s back.

“Uhh, hi.” He said.

“Thanks Chase.” Jeremy said and released him, suddenly aware of how weird that burst of emotion was. Chase just smiled in response, “Go get ‘em kiddo.” and walked to his car. Jeremy turned to the building and fidgeted with the bracelet that unlocked the door.

Jeremy cautiously walked down the main hallway, watching the doors for movement. He peeked inside a room to check if it was empty, then grabbed a sturdy looking wooden chair and dragged it over to the parts and service room. He propped it against the door, jamming it underneath the handle and hopefully locking the animatronics inside. The lock on this door wasn’t as advanced as the one on the front door, it required a physical key which he didn’t have. So he had to live with a good old fashioned chair. Down the hall, Jeremy noticed a weird black contraption sitting on the table next to the broken tablet. He walked the length of the hall, continuing to keep an eye out for any animatronics. Jeremy was fairly sure that they didn’t turn on until 12 AM came, but it didn’t hurt to check. He picked up the object and realized that it was one sort of flashlight. Except it had a handheld radio taped to it as well as… a taser? Welded to the bottom of the device was a taser connected to a big rechargeable battery. A circuit board was attached as well to the heavy black flashlight. The whole thing was quite heavy due to the large battery welded to the side. But it was a good weight, fairly balanced. He’d just have to watch out for the taser on the bottom. He clicked the light on and jumped as the taser sparked noisily and the light flashed on and off on its own. He clicked the button again and it went silent.

“Not a very stealthy light.” He muttered, but nonetheless was grateful for it. A friend of Chase had made this? Suddenly with a powering down noise, the lights in the building shut off. The phone began ringing and Jeremy waited for the message to play, vaguely wondering why a prerecorded message had to ring before playing. After a few rings, the message played.

“Hello? Hello? Uh, hey there, night four! I told you you'd get the hang of it!

Ok, so uh, just to update you, uh, there's been somewhat of an, uh, investigation going on. Uh, we may end up having to close for a few days... I don't know.”

Jeremy raised an eyebrow at that and picked up the broken tablet. A section of the screen was missing but the touchscreen still worked. He flipped through cameras while he waited.

“ I want to emphasize though that it's really just a precaution. Uh, Fazbear Entertainment denies any wrongdoing. These things happen sometimes. Um... It'll all get sorted out in a few days. Just keep an eye on things and I'll keep you posted.

Uh, just as a side note though, try to avoid eye contact with any of the animatronics tonight if you can. Someone may have tampered with their facial recognition systems - we're not sure. But the characters have been acting very unusual, almost aggressive towards the staff. They interact with the kids just fine, but when they encounter an adult, they just...stare.

Uh...Anyways, hang tight. It'll all pass. Good night!”

Jeremy paused when he heard that last part.  _ They acted normal around kids but not adults? I wonder if that’s why they attack me, do they think I’m an adult?  _ It made sense considering the position of nightguard would most likely be filled by an adult. He tapped the tablets screen a few more times, then decided to start winding the music box. He tapped where the icon for camera eleven should’ve been. But it wasn’t there, the broken screen had left out the camera for the prize corner. And his ability to wind the music box. He pointlessly tapped on the screen where camera eleven should be. Then sighed in defeat, looking down at the flashlight in his hand. He had about a few minutes until the box ran out and the puppet finally released.There were no clues as to how it would act or do anything. In fact, wasn’t it limited to it’s box? Maybe there was a way for him to rewind the music box at the prize corner. He got up cautiously, and walked down the hallway. He hadn’t heard anything walking around yet, but from the sounds of squeaking ahead, something was coming. Jeremy hid in a room underneath a table, the round boy with the balloons waddled past and went into the opposite room, crawling into the vent. They apparently still expected him to stay in the office, it was clearly a dumb maneuver that Jeremy wasn’t going to fall for. He climbed out from beneath the table, nearly dropping the flashlight. Moving with a bit more speed, he jogged into the main room full of silent arcade machines and still rides. The bunny was just barely stepping off of the stage. Jeremy gripped the flashlight, remembering what the man over the phone said about flashing lights. It would stun them and cause them to reset, hopefully giving him a chance to escape before they turned back on. He kept a wary eye on Bonnie and a few arcade cabinets between him and the murderous robot.

It eventually made its way down the hall and towards the office. Jeremy snuck along the wall until he reached the prize corner. The closed box sat on the ground, commanding its own space with a threatening aura. He didn’t understand why it had such a big box for such a slender and small puppet, but it wasn’t important. He looked along the sides of the box for some kind of button or winch to wind the box with. Unfortunately all sides of the box were smooth, with no openings or latches. Jeremy gulped and stood up as much as he could without revealing himself. There was only one option left, he creeped around to the front of the box and grabbed the handle that allowed someone to open the box manually. He steeled himself to run, then slowly opened the lid with a slight creak that almost made him jump out of his skin. Nothing popped out yet, so he continued. More and more he lifted the lid until it was fully open, Jeremy hesitantly peeked into the purple striped box. Inside, the puppet was curled into the fetal position. It’s eyes glowed like the others, but more subdued. Like an ember compared to a candle flame. They flickered gently, almost hypnotizingly. Screwed into the side of the box was an old fashioned music box. It looked very out of place and was attached to a small motor that presumably wound it. The box played its jaunty tune over and over. Jeremy felt as if it was faintly familiar, like he’d heard it somewhere before. He reached out for the small metal handle of the music box, and then it stopped turning. The music stopped, and the puppets eyes flared to life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wonder if anybody’s noticed the Major Character Death tag on this book yet...
> 
> It’s been there a long time.


	25. Chapter 25

Jeremy froze, then stumbled back into an animatronic. It was Toy Chica, having somehow silently gotten off the stage and moved to ambush him. He screamed and thrashed, then realized it wasn’t moving. It’s arms were outstretched and unmoving, it took Jeremy a second to realize that it’s eyes were no longer black with that creepy white dot in the center. They were back to the creepily realistic human eyeballs. Jeremy hesitantly moved around it and turned around. The puppet hadn’t moved yet, the box’s lid remained open, but a quick jingle played. One Jeremy recognized as Pop Goes the Weasel. The music was less tinny than the music that had come from the music box. This sounded like it was coming from a speaker. Jeremy watched in horror as a black hand slowly rose from the box. It was followed by the Marrionettes white mask, the mask detailed with a wide smile, purple tears, and dark eyes. Eyes now brightly lit even brighter than the animatronics eyes. He heard a loud crash and turned quickly to see Mangle slip from the ceiling and fall still. It’s eyes were also back to normal. Jeremy turned and immediately leapt to the side as the Marrionette dived at him. It had impossibly, been removed from its strings which now trailed along behind it. Jeremy stared in wide eyed shock as it picked itself up off the ground, then levitated into the air. His phone started to ring.

“Fuck.”

“Hey mom!” Jeremy greeted with a fake cheery voice as he sprinted past cheap rides and dodged behind arcade cabinets while the Marionette floated after him, arms outstretched and string trailing along behind it.

“Hey sweetie. How’s work?” Julia asked, also out of breath.

“Good. What uh...what are you doing?” He asked.

“I’m exercising!” She said brightly. “I decided it would be a good idea to go on a late night jog since I’m awake anyways.”

“Oh...neat. That sounds like a-urp.” He was interrupted by a run in with the bowling ball kid. A literal run in, the boy’s outstretched arm caught him in the stomach. And he wheezed for a moment before responding.

“That sounds like a good idea.” Jeremy jumped up on the stage, now confident that all the other animatronics were inactive, and hid behind the closed curtains. He couldn’t hear the Marrionete moving outside, so he watched the edge of the curtain, waiting for it to move. Jeremy felt a leathery hand grab his leg and he shouted as he was dragged from beneath the curtain out onto the stage. The Marionettes smile seemed to mock him as it reached for his throat. He punched it in its chest seemingly catching it by surpise as it rolled off of him. Jeremy got to his feet and pointed the flashlight at it, clicking the button. The light flashed blindingly, temporarily ruining his faint night vision. The Marrionette raised its arm to cover its eyes, then fell still. Jeremy turned it off and looked at its frozen form. It suddenly jumped out at him soundlessly, Jeremy swung the flashlight hitting its mask. There was a crack and a bit of plastic flew off of the Marionettes mask.

“What was that?” Julia asked.

“Oh I just dropped something.” Jeremy backed away from it.

A long crack stretched from its left cheek to the bottom of its eye. It’s eyes dimmed slightly and it went limp. A stomping from behind him signalled that or of the toy animatronics had reactivated. Jeremy lunged out of the way of Toy Freddy’s grasp and ran towards the office. He looked behind his shoulder and saw Toy Freddy’s eyes dim, then the Marrionettes eyes brightened. Those pieces of evidence suddenly clicked together in his brain.  _ The animatronics aren’t trying to kill me. The Puppet is, the Puppet is controlling them somehow. That’s why it stays in its box and why their eyes sometimes mimicked the Puppets. When it’s music box ran down, it released control of the other animatronics and hunted me down itself. _ A split second later, he heard a clanking from nearby. Then a familiar static noise, he ran down the hall and away from it before it could untangle itself.

“I’m worried about you honey. You’ve seemed stressed these last few days. Is everything okay at work?”

Down at the office, he snatched the Freddy mask and aimed his light down the hall to make sure it wasn’t following him. 

“Yea mom. Everything’s fine.”

He could hear Pop Goes the Weasel echoing menacingly down the hall. The light clearly didn’t work on it for some reason, probably due to that fact that the only circuitry that moved it was in the ceiling machine that operated the strings. It had only faked being stunned, which meant that not only was it intelligent, but that it knew of the flaws of the Toy animatronics. It had strategies, and plans, could think ahead. And it was hunting him as long as he still breathed. He heard a scraping, then the Marionette came into view, dragging its pointed fingers along the wall. Jeremy braced himself and charged at the Marionette, taser outstretched. The Marionette raised an arm as if to backhand him, but Jeremy blocked the arm with his hand and stabbed at its chest before it could. He activated the taser and watched the tip spark and electricity jump from the flashlight to the Marionettes chest. It jolted and fell backwards from the force. While it was distracted, Jeremy ran back to the office and dove into the right side vent.

“Was that a taser? I could’ve sworn I heard a taser sparking.” Julia said. “Jeremy I’m going to come by whether I can come inside or not. I want you to show up by the front doors and wave.”

He ignored Julia’s question for the moment as he tried to steady his breathing as the Marionette got to its feet and floated into the office. Jeremy crawled through the vent as quietly as possible, emerging in an empty party room. He hid under a table and put the Freddy mask on, just in case.

“Everything’s fine mom. I promise.”

Jeremy breathed heavily through the heavy mask on his head, his own hot breath made his face feel uncomfortably damp. He tried to look through the eyeholes of the mask but they were infuriatingly too low for him to see anything but the floor of his hiding spot. He heard the faint, quick jingle of that pale-faced freak show coming steadily closer. Jeremy shivered and gripped the flashlight in his hand. He heard a scratching noise just to his left, in the direction of the door. Jeremy lifted the mask just enough to peer from underneath the table. He saw the black and white striped legs dragging along the floor, not even supporting the abomination above them.  _ How does it just float like that?  _ Jeremy thought stunned. It paused right next to the table he was under, he held his breath and watched its knees slowly bend despite them not holding any weight, despite the supernatural puppet being able to float through the air. Jeremy prepared himself to kick out, but before he could, something grabbed him from behind, and yanked him out screaming from under the table.

“Jeremy? Jeremy!” Julia’s tinny voice came through the speaker of the dropped phone.

Jeremy furiously wheeled his arms around, trying to get free of whoever had grabbed him.

“Jeremy! Run!” It was Chase, he had a crowbar in his hand and a terrified look on his face. He turned towards the Marionette and pointed the crowbar at it, “Come get me you son of a bitch!” He screamed, the Marionette's expression didn’t change, but Jeremy somehow got the impression that it was angry. It raised a pointy fingered hand and swiped at Chase, he blocked it with the crowbar and kicked it. The Marionette fell back and hit the floor. “Jeremy. Go. You can unlock the front doors with your wristband. Get out of here.” Jeremy was frozen in shock until Chase grabbed him by the shoulders.

“Go! Now!” He said, shocking Jeremy out of his stupor. The kid got up and ran for the door, the Marionette lunged for him but Chase tackled it. The spindly creature dug its fingers into Chases back but he held on. Jeremy ran out into the hall and looked behind him. Chase had rolled out into the hall, holding the flashlight that Jeremy must’ve dropped when Chase grabbed him. The older man flashed the light into the Marionettes face and threw it to the ground. It froze and stiffened up, “Chase! The light doesn’t-!”

Everything stopped, and then there was a scream. 

The Marionette pushed Chase off of it, and looked up at Jeremy. Its right arm was coated in blood. Jeremy looked down at Chase, a gaping hole in his shirt revealed the wound that the Marionette had given him while Chase thought it was paralyzed. Blood seeped out at a rate that Jeremy knew was fatal. The bells chimed, and the puppet collapsed on the ground limp. Jeremy ran next to Chase and knelt down by him. The man coughed and grinned, “Man, what a way to go huh? Killed by a kids entertainer.” He shook his head and coughed again, blood dribbling from his mouth.

“N-no. Ch-Chase you can’t die.” Jeremy stuttered, his arm twitched but he ignored it.

“Don’t worry kid. I’m content with it. I just wish…” He coughed again.

“I just wish my family was here. Abigail, Rylee, and poor little Angelina.” He murmured, starting to sound tired.

“I...no. No Chase! I’ll call an ambulance or something just hold on-!” Chase grabbed Jeremy’s hand and gripped it tight.

“No. Just...it’s too late for me. Promise me something, promise that you won’t let the company get away with this. Don’t...let them cover up more death...first those poor kids...then the owner himself...and now me.” Jeremy nodded, tears streaking down his face.

“I p-promise.” He said, Chase nodded and he looked into Jeremy’s eyes.

“Tell my Abby...that the code is 9...18...27. It’ll have everything they need. And that she...was the last star.” Chase smiled, “And tell your mom she did good with you. You’re a great kid Jeremy.” Chase’s eyes slowly closed.

“No. No! Chase!” Jeremy grabbed his head, “Chase! Y-you can’t die...you…” The older man's last breath slipped out, mingling with the racking sobs of Jeremy’s despair. His shirt was smeared with Chase’s blood, but he didn’t care. Nothing mattered anymore. Someone just died because of him. He felt a pit in his stomach, an empty hole, a vacancy...

Chase Allen was dead.


	26. Chapter 26

He snuck through the halls of the school, Brian Whiton had told him to show up around this time. 10:30 was the latest he had ever stayed up, he usually went to bed early. But that morning, Brian had cornered him and told him that if he didn’t show up at the school at 10:30 tonight, he would make sure Jeremy would never go home without several bruises. He knew that Jeremy wouldn’t go to Officer Black or any other teacher for help. And Jeremy wouldn’t, so he showed up tonight for whatever Brian wanted. He wandered around the school until he saw Brian and his cronies standing around by the cafeteria. Brian saw Jeremy and walked over, “There you are twerp.” Jeremy cringed away but didn’t leave as he approached, which is what every cell of his body was screaming at him to do.

“Listen Twitchgerald. We got word that Henderson the math teacher has a huge stash of  _ dollas  _ in his desk. We tried getting it yesterday but the damn door was locked.” Brian winked when he said dollas and one of his pals laughed. “I-I don’t know how to pick a lock.” Jeremy stuttered, suddenly aware of how dangerous a situation he was in. If they were caught then he’d certainly be at least suspended or worse.

“You don’t have to.” Brian smirked and pointed at the ceiling where a vent cover was embedded. Jeremy looked at it puzzled for a moment before turning white with fear.

“You want me to crawl through the vents?! What if I get hurt? What if I get stuck?!” Jeremy babbled with fear. Brian raised his hands, “Then you can back out. But trust me when I say that we’ll make your life a living hell if you don’t. Guardian angel or not...damn Black.” Brian cursed. Jeremy’s shoulder started twitching, then his leg.

“Lookit ‘em. E’s doin’ a lil’ dance.” One kid said with a really fake accent.

“Shut up Collin. Well? Are you gonna do it?” Brian asked impatiently. Jeremy slowly nodded and looked at the vent.

“How am I supposed to get up?” He asked. Brian just grinned.

“1...2...3!” Brian and another of his friends tossed Jeremy up as hard as they could. The small lid sailed through the vent opening and frantically clutched onto anything in the inside to prevent him from falling back out.

“Hey, he stayed in this time.” Brian rubbed his head where Jeremy had accidentally kicked him when he fell back through the vent opening the last time they threw him through there.

“Alright now just climb that way and drop into the room. The cash should be in a desk drawer.” Jeremy gulped and started crawling.

“O-okay.” He said shakily, fear starting to overtake his muscles as he started twitching even harder. A screw sticking out of the metal wall cut his arm as he winced in pain.

“Hurry up shithead!” Brian shouted. Jeremy crawled faster, tears streaking down his face uncontrollably. He finally reached the vent above the math room, he grabbed it and gently pushed it out, then pulled it up through the vent and placed it inside. Below him was nothing but a few desks that didn’t look comfortable to land on. He climbed down and dangled from the ceiling for a moment before dropping down and landing on a chair. It wasn’t as far of a fall as he thought but it was still a jarring landing. He slowly walked up to the teachers desk and opened the first drawer. Inside was a bundle of hundred dollar bills wrapped together with a rubber band. He nervously picked it up, then hurriedly dropped it. Jeremy looked around for a rag or fabric, then wiped it off with a jacket left on the chair, making sure not to leave fingerprints. He then picked it up with his shirt sleeve and put it in his pocket. He heard something out the door and looked, Brian was there nodding and pointing to the vent. Jeremy walked over and put a chair on top of the desk underneath the vent. He climbed up into the vent accidentally kicking the chair over with a deafening clatter. He winced, then pulled himself up into the vent. Jeremy stopped to take a breath then started dragging himself through the vent. From ahead, he heard snickering, then footsteps. Jeremy got to the place where he entered then peeked through. They were gone, he saw the tail end of one of the boys leaving. Jeremy couldn’t get down without them, his breathing was heavy as he realized this was their plan the whole time. Get him trapped in the vents with a teachers money and when the faculty discovers him in the morning, he would be expelled. He started crying, then crawling around to find a way out. He couldn’t find a place where he could jump down into a hallway. All the classrooms were locked and the vent openings in the hallway were too high up.

An hour later, Jeremy sobbed in one of the vents. He had completely given up on getting out. He would have to wait until someone came in the morning. It was only about 1:20 now judging by the dim light on his watch that streamed through the vent. Jeremy got up and decided to wait out his punishment in a classroom. He flipped over and got to his hands and knees, then started crawling. Almost immediately, the screws attaching that section of the vent to the ceiling came off and that section plummeted to the ground, catching a few wires and cables and pulling them loose as well. Jeremy was halfway out of that section when it fell, causing him to fall from the cramped space and to entangle to his neck in the cords pulled loose from the ceiling. Jeremy gurgled quietly as the wires dug into his skin and cut off his circulation and air. His legs kicked uselessly, barely more than a foot off the tiled floor of the empty hallway. Jeremy’s vision blurred, from the lack of oxygen and from tears clouding his vision. His hearing went soon, overpowered by the desperate sound of his frantic heartbeat. He futile tried to lift his neck with his hands, or untie the cords. But his strength had left him, his arms went limp and he finally gave up. For the last time, he closed his eyes, not that he could see anymore. Bright colors flashed beneath his eyelids, swirling patterns and lines. He felt so light, like he was floating…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might speed up chapter posting times. I have the rest of it all written out. But I gotta keep cliffhangers cliffhangy no matter what you guys want. So I’ll speed up posting times, but I won’t get it all out in one day. Expect another chapter in two days or so. Depends on how benevolent I feel.


	27. Chapter 27

Chase slid the key to his front door into the lock and unlocked the oak door. Immediately he heard squeals from inside and he opened the door to see his two younger daughters charging towards him with their arms outstretched.

“Daddyyyyy!” They both shouted and hugged him before he even got through the door.

“What’s going on? Shouldn’t you be in bed?”

He chastised them but couldn’t hide the smile on his face from seeing his daughters.

“Its only 6 o’ clock!” Angelina protested.

“Yea we haven even eated dinner yet!” Rylee added. Chase raised an eyebrow and looked up at his wife.

“I don’t know, maybe we should have an early bedtime tonight.” His wife Abby said teasingly.

“Nooooo!” Rylee shouted and Angelina gave her a thumbs down with a frowny face.

“Okay, I guess not.” Abby rolled her eyes dramatically.

“Meatballs!” Rylee screamed and ran into the kitchen.

“Well there goes the surprise.” Abby sighed. Chase smiled and kissed her cheek.

“You made the asian meatballs? Those are my favorite!” He exclaimed happily.

“I know.” Abby said matter-of-factly and guided him inside.

“These are even more amazing then last time.” Rylee said around a mouthful of meatball.

“Don’t talk with your mouth full. And thank you Ry-Ry.” Abby said and speared another meatball with her fork.

“Pass the sauce please.” Angelina asked and Chase slid the bowl of meatball sauce down the table.

“So when is the company going to put you back to work? You’ve been on that paid leave for three months now. Ever since they replaced you with that Michel guy.” Abby asked Chase.

“I’m not sure, they’re keeping me around because they’re trying to find a place to put me. Apparently I’m valuable enough to not fire.” Abby smiled, “That’s good.” Chase’s pocket started vibrating, someone was calling him. He checked who it was, then frowned.

“Excuse me for a moment. It’s work.” Chase said.

“Maybe they’re finally bringing you back?” Abby said hopefully. Chase shrugged and answered it, walking into his office.

“Chase Allen speaking.” He said.

“Hello Mr. Allen, as you’ve been long awaiting we have found a new location for you to work in.” Chase silently pumped a fist.

“That’s great to hear. Where is it at?”

“A long ways out of town. We are only requiring you to work for a week then return home.” Chase frowned. It sounded suspiciously like-

“Don’t worry, you won’t be working the night guard position. It will be the same position as your last job. Just a new place with new faces.” Chase breathed a silent breath of relief.

“I’ve emailed you the address to the location and a hotel that the company will pay for while you are away from home.” The man said.

“Alright, when do I start?” Chase asked.

“As soon as you get your bags packed, we’ll have a Uber at your door 9:00 sharp tomorrow morning.”

“Sounds good Mister…” Chase trailed off.

“Emily. Mister Emily.” Mr. Emily said and hung up. Chase gulped,  _ Was that really him? Why would  _ he _ reassign him? _ He nervously walked back into the kitchen where his family awaited him.

“So?” Abby asked.

“I’m working somewhere out of town for the next week. They have a pre-paid hotel and a person to drive me there.” Chase said and sat down. Abby raised an eyebrow.

“That’s...peculiar.” She said hesitantly.

“You’re telling me.” Chase said and took another bite of his wife’s cooking.

“Bye honey! Remember to call!” Abby shouted and waved as Chase packed his bags into the trunk.

“I will.” He called back and waved at her. His two daughters ran up and hugged his legs.

“I’ll miss you most daddy.” Angelina shouted.

“No I will!” Rylee protested.

“Nuh-uh!” Angelina said back.

“Hey, no fighting alright? Help your mother out. I’ll be back in a week.” Chase scolded gently.

“I love you girls.” He kisses their foreheads and got into the car. Chase turned and waved at them, his girls were on either side of his wife and they were all waving. He smiled.

“Nice family.” The man driving said.

“Amazing family.” Chase corrected. And they took off.


	28. Chapter 28

Jeremy cradled Chase’s head in his arms, his corpse had long since gotten cold. He refused to believe that he was dead, he couldn’t be. After all he had done for Jeremy. The flashlight lay on the older mans chest, it had blood all over the handle from Chase, he wasn’t dead. Jeremy reminded himself, then looked down at his face. Despair swelled in his throat and he began sobbing again.

A while later, Jeremy heard the beep of the front door unlock. He looked up and realized that it was morning already. A group of people walked around the corner and saw Jeremy.

“Oh, the night guard is still here. Kevin, meet Jeremy.” He recognized Emilia seemingly giving a new employee a tour of the place. Then they noticed the body.

“Jeremy is that Mr. Allen? Is he alri-…oh my God.” Her face paled as she saw the blood, then the puppet limp on the ground nearby. One of the people turned green and ran to the bathrooms. Another guy wasn’t as quick reacting and vomited right then and there. Emilia held a hand to her heart and ran over as if to help. Jeremy stood helplessly and watched as she kneeled down and looked as if she was about to administer CPR. Then she realized that he was too far gone. She closed her eyes then looked towards Jeremy. “We’re closing temporarily. I need you to go cover the windows with the curtains and make sure the door is locked before you leave.” Jeremy numbly got up and walked down the hallway. He pulled the string that dropped a fabric curtain over the windows, then left and locked the door.

“You’re home really late, what happened?” Julia said angrily when Jeremy walked through the door.

“Hey! Don’t ignore me!” Jeremy just kept walking to his room and closed the door behind him.  _ What’s up with him? _ She wondered, then realized what she had just seen on Jeremy’s shirt. She speed walked to his room and opened the door.

“Jeremy, why is there blood on...your…” Jeremy was sitting on his bed hunched over and trembling, hands over his face.

“Jer-bear what happened at work?” She asked softly. He ignored her and silently cried into his hands. She sat by him for a moment before getting up and getting a fresh set of clothes out for him, setting them next to him.

“Let me know when you’re feeling up to talk buddy.” She left his room. Jeremy sat for hours, then finally changed and went to sleep. Julia checked on him and saw him sleeping, his face red and a restless expression. She worried that whatever happened might magnify his night terrors. He would sometimes fall asleep without remembering it, Jeremy had described it as a seamless transition from reality to dream. He’d fall asleep in his bed and the next second he was dreaming he was laying on the couch in his parents house. Julia sobered at the thought of his parents, they had gone to jail for severely abusing him to nearly the point of death. The poor boy didn’t even remember it. That’s what brought him to Julia’s arms. She herself wasn’t capable of conceiving a child, so she adopted him. Julia sighed and sat down at her computer, she made sure nobody was at the door and typed in the address for the online dating site.

Jeremy ran through the halls of the pizzeria. He had realized he was dreaming but didn’t necessarily want to wake up just yet. Ahead of him, Chase Allen jogged a few paces away. Jeremy ran faster to catch up, but the older man remained out of reach.

“Chase! Come back!” He yelled. The man stopped and turned around, he had the puppets mask over his face. Jeremy stopped and shouted, “Get away from him!” Long strings tied themselves around Chase’s limbs and made him dance slowly. Jeremy tried to run towards Chase and untied him, but more strings came down and wrapped Jeremy up. He looked up and saw a little girl holding the paddle that the strings were connected to. She expertly maneuvered it and made Chase dance slowly. More strings whipped out and tied themselves around people Jeremy knew. Emilia from the restarcade, his best friend Adrian, his mom and Lilac, a younger looking version of himself. The thick strings wrapped around his younger self’s neck and strangled him. Jeremy tried to move, or do anything. But he was no longer in control of himself. He danced silently with the rest of them. He saw the animatronics, their eyes glowing bright and invisible strings wrapped around their appendages. His vision slowly went dark, then he felt something grab his legs.

Jeremy woke up coughing, his throat burned. He got up and looked around, his room was dark, a set of clothes was on his bed. He didn't remember those being there. Moonlight streamed through the window, illuminating the carpeted floor. It was 11:15, time for him to go to work, time for him to throw his life on the line for his family. The Marionette would be waiting for him, it's malevolent grin mocking his every move. Why did it kill? What reason would it have to target employees after dark with the intent of ending their lives. It was clearly sentient, somehow. It had no circuit boards or anything to Jeremy's knowledge. Was it possessed or something? It couldn't be a rouge AI program or anything like that. Jeremy remembered his dream, there was a little girl holding the strings. Could she represent the Marionette? He remembered Lilac referring to the puppet as a she. Did they both subconsciously realize that the puppet was possessed by a little girl? The questions bounced in his mind, demanding attention. Jeremy shook his head and focused, he had a job to do. He peeked under his bed and reached for something, then pulled out a long, wooden baseball bat.

Jeremy pulled up to a parking lot near the front doors and parked. In the backseat was a mostly empty backpack. He grabbed it and got out of the car, he noticed out of the corner of his eye a man was standing by the large sign proclaiming the name of the restarcade. Jeremy ignored him and walked to the front doors. He unlocked them and felt a brief pang of sadness when Chase didn't greet him at the doors. He shrugged it off and walked to the office, the handle of his old baseball bat sticking up from the backpack.

“Hello, hello? Hey, good job, night 5! Um hey, um, keep a close eye on things tonight, ok? Um, from what I understand, the building is on lock down, uh, no one is allowed in or out, y'know, especially concerning any...previous employees." Jeremy frowned,  _ did someone get fired? _

"Um, when we get it all sorted out, we may move you to the day shift, a position just became...available. Uh, we don't have a replacement for your shift yet, but we're working on it. We're going to try to contact the original restaurant owner. Uh, I think the name of the place was ‘Fredbear's Family Diner’ or something like that. It's been closed for years though, I doubt we'll be able to track anybody down. Well, just get through one more night! Uh, hang in there! Goodnight!” Jeremy got up now that the tape was finished, down the hall Mangle was crawling along the ceiling. He took out the taser flashlight and pointed it towards the spider-like machine. It leapt towards him screeching, but missed when Jeremy ducked under it. He jammed the taser into one of its limbs and activated it. It screeched again and it's eyes went back to normal. The boy opened his backpack and removed several black zip ties. He quickly attached a few to each other and wrapped them around several joints and pulled it as tight as he could. Jeremy repeated the process, having to pause and flash the light at an approaching robot twice. The mangled mess started to twitch again and it's eyes darkened to the white pinprick light. It tried to get up but the zip ties kept its body tangled and knotted. Jeremy checked it again to ensure it was secure, then turned to deal with the rest of them. He started by dragging the desk near one of the vents, then a few of the television screens piled by the wall. Then he sat in the chair and waited, flashing away any robots approaching the office. Finally Toy Bonnie went into the right party room and entered the vent, Jeremy got up and tipped the desk over and moved it to block the vent. Then piled up the TVs to make sure it didn't push through them. He jogged to the party room that it was trapped in and blocked the other side of the vent with a party table and chairs. A screech behind him told him that one of the others had seen him. He whipped around and flashed the light, the large and decayed bear covered its eyes, but the broken chicken behind it had no chance. It locked up and tipped over, the bear catching it and setting it down.  _ Wait...it caught it? Are they actively working together? Are they sentient too? _ Jeremy looked at the bears eyes and saw that it's eyes weren't blacked out. They were normal, did that mean it wasn't controlled by the Marionette? He recalled that the fox animatronic had spoken, very stuttery and impossible to understand. But it had nonetheless. He took advantage of the old Freddy helping the old Chica and dashed out. Foxy was out there, it saw him and seemed surprised, then growled statically and raised its hook.

"I know you're alive.” Jeremy said. The fox glared, "S...o?” It spoke shakily.

“Why are you trying to kill me?” He asked.

“Mi...el...et…” It looked frustrated at it’s lack of ability to communicate.

“Be...tray...al.” It said slowly.

“I never betrayed you. I’ve never even met-.” It snarled again.

“Mi...ch...el.” It said, Jeremy heard a stomping behind him and leapt out of the way. Old Freddy stumbled as it’s attack missed. The chicken saw Jeremy’s dodge and started to run after him, its arms outstretched to the sides. He stuck the taser into its arm as it passed, then tased Old Freddy just as it was about to recover.

“Why are you doing this!” Jeremy shouted at Foxy. It growled and charged at him, he grabbed the hook on the downswing and swung on it causing the fox to lose its balance and topple.

“Stay out of my way then.” He said and tased the fox in the face.

Jeremy wiped his hands off after he finished shoving the old animatronics into the other vent. Chica being the most difficult due to its arms being outstretched. He had to disconnect the wires in the arms, causing them to go limp. He blocked off one end with a tipped over table and the other end he blocked with the rest of the televisions. Toy Freddy and Toy Chica had attempted to come after him several times, but the flashlight had warded them off for a while now. Jeremy had to readjust the desk and televisions where Toy Bonnie had tried to get out, they weren’t incredibly strong, just heavy. Toy Freddy lumbered towards him from down the hallway, it’s footsteps echoing down the empty hall. Jeremy flashed the light and dashed up to taser it while it was stunned. He made sure Toy Bonnie wasn’t at his end, then stuffed Toy Freddy in there too. Any second now the puppets music box would run down, and he would be forced to face his tormentor. He saw Toy Chica speed walking towards him with its arms out to grab him. He got ready to flash its eyes and tase it, but it suddenly stopped. Jeremy watched its eyes fade back to normal and its arms return to its side. Down the hall, he heard Pop Goes the Weasel playing quickly. Jeremy grabbed the handle of the bat sticking out of the backpack and pulled it free slowly. 

“You killed my friend.” Jeremy said calmly, inside his emotions were a tumultuous ball of anger and hate. But he channelled it into something else.

Purpose and determination. He raised his bat and charged at the Marionette.


	29. Chapter 29

The Marionette blocked his swing with its hand but missed his kick. The flimsy wooden creature fell backwards, its wood and leather limbs clattering on the floor. It got up and leapt at him aggressively, Jeremy punched its face and fell with a roll to the side. The Marionette recovered quickly and swung its clawed hand at him. Jeremy blocked it with his bat and tackled it. It held his weight for a moment while still floating, then with a feeling like a balloon popping beneath him, he fell onto it. Its mask had cracked even more, and there was a tear in its leg. He slammed the heel of his hand into its mask and broke it off. Beneath the mask, a mess of wires, a speaker, and the floating lights where the eyes should be, made up the interior of its head as well as a ball of dark metal with wires coming out of it. Jeremy paused, confused as to why that was in there. The Marionette pushed him off of it and floated up. Jeremy scowled at it and unzipped his backpack revealing a long, flat blade in a green fabric sheath. He pulled it out and revealed a military grade machete, it had been his grandpas. He had given it to his only grandson after he had passed with the message, “Please don’t kill anyone with it.”

The Marionette glanced at the backpack and lunged for it. Jeremy kicked its arm away and slashed at it with the machete, tossing the bat away for now. The Marionette recovered quickly and started to float away quickly, Jeremy chased it into the main party room. It turned to see Jeremy still following it, it rose to the ceiling and crawled inside of a vent. He threw the machete at it, but it missed and bounced off the ceiling. He heard a screeching, then saw Toy Chica charge towards him at full speed, it’s eyes indicating that it was possessed by the puppet. Jeremy cursed, then took out a plastic Ziploc back full of water. He raised it threateningly but the rabid robot ignored it. Jeremy threw the bag hard, nailing it right in the mouth. Unfortunately the bag didn’t break or open, so it just stuck inside where it’s beak should’ve been. He tried dodging to the side, but the robot clipped his shoulder and sent him spinning to the ground. The machete spun away out of reach and Toy Chica stood over him, then reached down towards his face. Jeremy grabbed its wrist and pulled himself up quickly forcing the chicken off balance. He threw it to the ground, hearing a loud crack as its head hit the tile floor. Jeremy ran to the office and grabbed the baseball bat. Down the hall, Toy Chica approached, a crack running down its face and twitching a bit. Jeremy pulled another water bag from his backpack and opened it a small bit. Then once Toy Chica got close, he tossed it, this time hitting its neck and the bursting the bag. Toy Chica immediately started buzzing loudly and sparking. Smoke started to rise from its circuits and the smoke alarm started to go off. Jeremy cursed, and ran past Toy Chica.

The Marionnette lay curled in the vent, she relinquished Toy Chica from her control and tried to control Toy Freddy. But the plastic bear was still trapped with the bunny. Mangle was also out of commission, and the old animatronics didn’t allow her to control them. Balloon Boy was next to useless in this situation, there was…the other Freddy. But she didn’t know where they were, or if they could even be controlled.

Jeremy waited beneath the vent that the Marionette had escaped into. He could still see a part of it in the vent, it didn’t look like it was going anywhere soon. The short balloon kid was nearby, constantly repeating, “Hi!” Over and over again. He was starting to get really annoyed with it, the short robot was probably just acting as it’s eyes for the moment being. Finally he walked over to it and kicked it over, it tried to run away but fell over and smacked its face on the tiled floor. It continued to repeat itself, Jeremy growled and left it there attempting to get back on its feet like an overturned turtle. He got sick of waiting and dragged a table underneath the vent, then stacked a chair on top of the table and climbed up to the vent. He immediately heard the balloon kid go still and a frantic scrambling from above him. Jeremy growled and pulled himself up into the vent. 

The Marionette jerkily pulled itself through the vent ahead of Jeremy, the boy followed it through as quickly as possible. The chase had been going on for about 5 minutes, neither party getting away or catching the other. There wasn’t enough space to swing or throw anything at the Marionette so he tried to grab its strings that dangled along behind it. They were about as thick as a shoelace, but seemed to just slip out of his hands. Ahead of him, the Marionette turned a corner and from the sound of it, dropped back onto the ground. Jeremy had lost track of where they were and was surprised to find himself in the main hallway outside the office. The Marionette was floating towards where he had blocked the Toy animatronics.

“Not on God's green earth you don’t.” Jeremy growled then dashed for the floating puppet, grabbing its torso and throwing it backwards. He heard it clatter to the ground, and turned to attack it again. Suddenly it swung its arm forwards quickly, whipping its string around and catching Jeremy in the face. He reached up and felt a thin line of blood across his cheek. It had somehow whipped its string fast enough to cut him.

“Fine then.” Jeremy lifted the flashlight with Chase's name engraved on it.

“Come get me Marionette.” The Marionette stepped forwards, then froze. Jeremy full out charged at it, taser raised.

Something had changed. The Marionette froze in her place as she realized, this was not an adult. This was a child, she was hunting a child. She had sworn to protect the children. It came together now, this boy was just wearing the adult’s costume. Without the hat and uniform, looking as terrified yet determined as he did, the boy looked just like the children. The Marionette bowed her head as the young boy swung his weapon.


	30. Chapter 30

A bright flash lit the dark hallway, Jeremy felt a deep thrum go through his body as he slammed the taser into the mass of metal at the center of the puppets head. There was a loud crackling and a sound like a gunshot. He winced and looked down at the limp puppet on the ground, he had a killer headache. The puppet lay still, the glow having gone from its eyes. Jeremy stood up and looked down at it, he was done here. He went to the vents and unblocked them, there was angry buzzing and static coming from the vents that the old animatronics were in. In Toy Freddy’s and Toy Bonnie’s vent was just silence. He took out his pocket knife and cut the ties that bound Mangle. It still didn’t move, he figured that it was so damaged that without the puppet controlling it, it wasn’t even feasible for it to move. Jeremy suddenly felt the effects of his exertion, his body sore from fighting and running. He walked to one of the party rooms and laid down underneath a table. His phone started to buzz, Julia probably. He ignored it. Jeremy faintly heard the front doors open, but ignored it as well. It was probably just his imagination.

Officer Black cautiously held his gun out as he explored the school grounds. He had heard a deafening crash somewhere in the school. He had been working on a rather stubborn crossword puzzle in his office when he heard the noise and immediately stood up. He had sworn that he heard footsteps earlier, but the aged officer had chalked it up to his old ears playing tricks on him. _Getting up in my years,_ _ really should accept that job at the bank. _ He said and turned down a hallway. At first he didn’t recognize the object in the center of the hall. He squinted at it for a moment, wondering if it was just some piece of the air conditioning that had fallen from the ceiling. Then it moved faintly, and Officer Black nearly shouted. He ran forwards and grabbed the young boys legs, lifting him up. A raspy gasping air told him that the kid had gotten a much needed breath. He strained his muscles to lift him higher and the boy slowly helped himself out by twisting his neck to free himself. It took a heart-wrenching moment but with the pressure on his neck gone, it was much easier to slip from the noose made of the electrical cords dangling from the ceiling. The kid fell to the ground and gasped for air loudly.

“Hey. Hey! Listen to me, you oka-.” Officer Black stopped suddenly and softly gasped.

“Jeremy?”

“They made you crawl through the vents? Why?” Officer Black asked. Jeremy silently took out the roll of money and put it in the old man's hand. He looked down at it confused, then realization dawned.

“Ahh yes. Mister Thomas’s stash. I told him it was a stupid idea to keep it there.” Jeremy just stared straight ahead.

“If you tell me the names of the kids, I can get them busted for good. Probably kick them out of school for a good while.” Jeremy shook his head fervently. The police officer looks at him curiously, “Why not?” Jeremy hesitated, then spoke in a hoarse tone.

“They’ll only...get me again later.” He coughed in the middle of the sentence, his throat burned and he stood up.

“I need to go home.” He said and started walking.

“Hold on! I’ll drive ya.” The elderly police officer stood and followed Jeremy out and led him to his car. He drove him to his house, an address he knew well now, and dropped him off.

“Take care Jeremy, drink lots of water okay? I’ll see you tomorrow.” He waved, but Jeremy didn’t turn around. He just walked inside and closed the door. Officer Black sighed and drove back to the school.

“I’ll call the bank tomorrow.” He murmured to himself, and adjusted his badge pinned to his breast, right next to where his prosthetic heart pumped steadily in his chest.

Jeremy closed the front door behind him and walked inside. A light surprised him, Lilac was standing by the fridge holding a glass of ice water.

“Jeremy?” She said quietly. Her voice startled him, that was the first time since he met her that she had said his name. He turned away to go to bed, but stopped when he heard her voice again, it was so soft.

“What happened to your neck?” His hand went up to his throat and rubbed the heavy bruising that covered it.

“Nothing.” He rasped, she walked up to him and held out the glass cup of ice water.

“Your voice sounds like it hurts.” Jeremy looked down at it then up at her. He hadn’t ever looked her in the eyes before, they were a sparkling green. Like cut emeralds on a jewelsmiths white cloth. He slowly reached out and took the water from her and sipped it. The coolness of it soothed his throat, his face felt wet. He reached up and realized that he was crying, Lilac stepped forwards and wrapped her arms around Jeremy.

“I know you don’t like me. But I hope a hug still makes you feel better.” Jeremy felt a sob rising in his throat and hugged her back. They sat there for five minutes, then Jeremy slowly let her go.

“I’m sorry Lilac. I’m sorry.” He said quietly.

“It’s okay. As long as we’re friends now.” She said hopefully.

“No, we aren’t friends. We’re siblings.” Jeremy hugged her again quickly.

“You need to go to bed.” Jeremy said and patted her back. She smiled and walked back to her room. Jeremy finished the water and went to his own bedroom. He walked past his moms office and noticed two folders sitting on her desk. He recognized them and walked over. Opening the one on top he read, ‘Official Adoption Documents: Lilac Evans’. He put the folder down and opened the other folder. It read, ‘Official Adoption Documents: Jeremy Madde.’ He smiled as he saw the names of his biological parents written on the papers. Jordan and Emma Madde, he wondered if they had gotten a visit approved yet. It had been a month since he last got to speak with them, the prison had a very strict policy on communication with inmates. He sighed and closed the folder, then went to bed.


	31. Chapter 31

“Hey, kid. Wake up.” Jeremy slowly woke up, feeling someone shaking his shoulder.

“Get up mister Fitzgerald.” It was a mans voice, gruff and stern. Jeremy opened his eyes and was astounded to see that creepy prowler that had been loitering around the building recently.

“What...how did you get in?” Jeremy said, suddenly aware that dealing with this guy was his job, his official job. Jeremy reached for his flashlight, but it wasn’t where he had left it. The man held it up and wiggled it.

“Looking for this? You broke the taser end, snapped the prongs, otherwise great workmanship.” The man handed it back, “Listen, You need you to leave. There are restricted and sensitive items in this building that you aren’t allowed to see.” Jeremy frowned and got up, the man got up as well from his kneeling position.

“I’m the night guard. I won’t be going anywhere, not that you can tell me to do that.” The man glared at him, “I don’t think you’re listening to me. Leave. Now.” Jeremy lifted his flashlight threateningly despite the taser being broken.

“I’m not going to leave. And sir, you’re just going to have to leave instead.” The man stared at him, his dark brown eyes boring into his skull.

“6 AM is in about an hour, I give you permission to leave early. As the owner of the goddamn company who’s building you are standing in. AS YOUR EMPLOYER.” The mans voice raised to a shout, then quieted.

“Leave. Now.” The man looked angry beyond belief.

“How do I know you’re the owner?” Jeremy said folding his arms, he was incredibly intimidated by this large, African American man.

“Cause I know what goes on here. I know how much you’ve struggled to survive these past few days. I watched you hold a dying man in your arms. And I’ve felt that grief a hundredfold. I saw you hunt down my marionette, I saw it all through the cameras. I’ve been watching since day one. Now, go.” The mans voice had gone soft and gentle, yet still firm. Jeremy nodded, trying to push the image of Chases bloody body out of his mind. 

“What’s your name?” He asked, turning to look at him. The man paused and looked at him.

“Henry. Henry Emily.”

Henry watched the boy leave, then went to work. He pulled out his own flashlight, a normal one unfortunately, and walked to Toy Chica who laid on her back in the hall. Still sparking and twitching, he left that one for later. He spent the next few minutes dragging Toy Freddy and Toy Bonnie’s limp bodies out of the vent. They were in decent condition still, just a few scratches and such. He wondered why she had picked Toy Chica over the rest of them. Poor Chica had been trashed by the night guard. Henry examined the electrical burns on the casing of the animatronic. They weren’t severe, they just stopped the robot from functioning until it got some mechanical attention. Then he froze, something was wrong. Looking around, he noticed that she was missing. Henry got up and ran around the arcade, breathing heavily. But there was no sign of the puppet.

Driving home, Jeremy thought deeply about what had just happened. That man, Henry. He had been watching the whole time? And didn’t lift a finger to help? What kind of man allowed things like that to happen? What reasons would he have to protect the puppet or at least what reasons would he have to not fix its murderous tendencies? None of it made sense, he had gotten a closer look at the medallion the man wore. It had an engraved name on it, ‘Mike’. Why was it so thick? It had to strain Henry’s neck to wear it. He pulled into the driveway of the apartments and parked, dreading having to walk out into the pouring rain.

There was a rustle from the backseat, and Jeremy froze. Something was back there. In the rear view mirror he saw the backseat slowly start to fold forwards. Beyond that, in the trunk, two glowing red eyes.

Jeremy threw the car door open and slammed it shut behind him. There was blurred movement inside the car, then the door clicked open. The Marionettes burning red eyes glared into his own terrified eyes. Jeremy ran up the slick stairs to the front door and ran inside, slamming the door shut. His flashlight was still in the car, there wasn’t any time to grab it in his blind panic.

“Jeremy? Why the hell are you slamming doors? People are trying to sleep!” Julia hissed as she speed walked in.

“Mom. There’s something following me. I need you to help me keep it out.” Jeremy said quickly and locked the door.

“What? Like an animal or something?” She asked confused and tired. Jeremy chose not to answer that and looked out the peephole in the door. The car looked empty, and the Marionette was nowhere to be seen. He turned around and saw Julia standing right behind him.

“Jeremy. What the hell is going on. Talk to me please.” Her eyes were desperate and frantic. Jeremy couldn’t stop himself, he started crying. Julia held him close and hugged him.

“The puppet...from work. It’s...alive. And it wants to kill me.” Julia stiffened.

“W-what? How?” She looked him in the eye.

“Are you serious?” Jeremy nodded, feeling pathetic as tears streamed down his face.

“Good God.” She muttered and looked through the peephole.

“Well I think we’re safe. The windows are locked so-“ There was the sound of shattering glass, then a few seconds later, Lilac screamed.


	32. Chapter 32

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was so excited for this portion of the story. It introduces a lot for the next book and lays down an important aspect of the entire story. So please, enjoy.

Julia reacted first, sprinting for Lilacs room tailed by Jeremy. They reached Lilac's room and Julia screamed. Jeremy looked in and saw the Marionette, the lack of a mask revealing the terrifying mess of wires and the intense red of its eyes. It’s worn and torn arms held Lilacs frantic body in a tight vise-like grip. It climbed out the window still holding Lilac while Jeremy and his mother were frozen in shock. He shouted and ran after it, cutting himself on the broken glass.

“Mom! Call the police!” He yelled before climbing out onto the fire escape.

Rain dripped into the empty space where the mask of the Marionette should’ve been as she climbed the stairs of the fire escape. She wanted revenge, so she took the one that the boy loved. She was attacked personally, not her body, but her soul. The pain of the overload of electricity had broken her mind, she realized that. But she was too far gone to care. Shr slipped and nearly dropped the child, tears mixed with the rain on her face as she cried for her brother and mother. The Marionette didn’t care, she knew somewhere deep down that this was wrong. But the burning desire for revenge and hatred clouded her thoughts.

Jeremy dashed up the fire escape, slipping and cutting his legs several times. He would’ve caught up to the Marionette and his sister by now if the rain wasn’t slicking the steps, making them extremely difficult to climb. He heard the Marionette slip above him, it’s ability to float seemed to be on the fritz at the moment. It would levitate up a few steps, then stop and land on the steps. He heard Lilacs crying from above him, and it spurred his movements. Pumping his legs up and down, he finally reached the top. His clothes were torn and damp, and his hair stuck to his head. The Marionettes was standing in the center of the roof. It’s eyes so intensely red that it hurt Jeremy to look into them.

“I wa-nted yo-you to watch as I-I hurt you-ou like you hu-rt-rt them.” The Marionette spoke, its voice high pitched and distorted. Jeremy glared at it and shouted.

“I didn’t hurt anybody! I never have! Why are you doing this?” He shouted across the roof. It snarled at him and held its bloodstained fingers by Lilacs throat. Jeremy shouted in panic, “Stop it! Okay? You were supposed to protect the children! You helped! Why do you destroy now! Why…” he choked up.

“Why did you kill him?”

The Marionette looked hesitant, moving its sharp fingers away from Lilac for a moment.

“He...hurt...th-em. H-e-e kill-ed them. I sa-aved them.” It stuttered along its words, the rain starting to affect the wiring.

“I bou-bound them to me-tal. Gave-ave-ave them life. So the-y-y could ta-ake revenge on the o-one that wr-ronged them.” Jeremy shook his head, rain streaming down his face.

“No. Chase didn’t kill them. I didn’t kill them. Your anger is blinding you. You need to go, pass on.” He insisted, slowly edging closer. The Marionette shook its head, tightening its hold on Lilac and pointing its sharp finger at her throat.

“I can’t. I…I a-am bound b-y metal as we-well.” It touched the metal ball inside its skull. Jeremy realized the connection, the metal ball contained its soul or something. The wires were what let it move its body. But who made the body? How did it even move? The Marionette looked down at Lilac, it’s grip started to loosen. Then it sparked and its eyes went dark for a moment. Jeremy hopefully stepped forwards, but the lights came right back on.

“GE-ET BACK!” It pressed its finger against Lilacs throat. She started to cough and choke, “NO!” Jeremy shouted. “LET HER GO DAMN YOU!” 

The Marionette snarled, then pressed harder. Jeremy saw a bead of red blood form, and blacked out.

The Marionette felt the child in her arms. A faint memory stirring in her mind. Just like now, in the rain, a child in her arms. But the child he held wasn’t moving. Why didn’t she move? The green wristband on her wrist called to him, over and over to help her. Miss Emily is outside, Miss Emily is outside, Miss Emily is outside. But the young girl didn’t move, the blood from the knife wound soaked into the metal limbs of the puppet. The metal limbs that would soon be reforged into a brain for the next generation of the puppet. The puppet pushed against her control, and they felt something spark.

Jeremy didn’t remember what happened, he had moments like that. Where something just  _ happened,  _ and his brain wiped it out. So Jeremy was startled when he found himself pinning the Marionette down and holding it by the neck. Blood pumped furiously through his veins, he could hear it in his ears. One of its legs had been broken off and a few wires had been torn out. It’s speaker sputtered noisily and senselessly. Jeremy was snarling at it, and he swore he could see fear in its eyes. He stood up and lifted it over the roof of the building. It dangled weakly, and Jeremy narrowed his eyes.

“Don’t ever touch my sister again.” He whispered and dropped the Marionette. It tried to grab the edge of the roof, but missed, and fell to the earth below. It’s thin form falling with the rain and disappearing. Jeremy turned to find Lilac laying on her side. He ran over to her and knelt down beside her, “Lilac?” She groaned weakly, the aftereffects of her intense allergic reaction before and the ordeals of the night surely painful to her.

“Oh thank God.” He hugged her close, the emotions of it all crashing down suddenly. He sobbed with his little sister in his arms as sirens approached in the distance.

**Epilogue**

Jeremy sat nervously in the passenger seat of the car. Julia was smiling and talking about some guy she had met a while ago. He wasn’t listening, he was thinking about last week. After the police had arrived, some representative of Fazbear Entertainment had called and said something to the police. They had argued for a long time before the officer had sighed and signaled them all to leave. There hadn’t been any sort of investigation behind it all, just gone. And then the Marionette...he sat up. They were there, “Alright Jeremy. I’ll pick you up later okay? Then once you get back you’re gonna have to start working on your homework.” He sighed and nodded. 

“Okay sweetie. I love you.” She patted the shoulder of his suit and waved goodbye.

“I love you too mom.” He sighed and got out of the car, making sure his styled hair wasn’t messed up. Then walked into the funeral home where somber organ music was being played.

The funeral home had done a very good job in hiding the gaping wound in Chase's chest. Jeremy cringed at the fact that he had thought that first. He looked down into the face of the only friend he had made here so far. Nearby, a woman sobbed with her two young girls, they looked similar to Chase in face and hair so he wondered if they were his daughters, and the woman his wife. He didn’t even know that Chase was married and had kids. Then he recalled when he had first met him, he had been talking to her over the phone. He was supposed to go back home after that day. Jeremy felt a sob rising and turned away to go sit down. 

“Who are you? I don’t recognize you.” Jeremy looked up and saw that Chase’s wife was talking to him. He wiped his eyes and smiled, “I’m Jeremy, I uh...I worked with him.” The woman’s eyes widened.

“Oh...you did? That’s…fantastic. Do you-“ she stopped and looked around.

“Do you know what actually happened?” She asked quietly, motioning for her little girls to go somewhere else. Jeremy frowned, “You don’t...know?” She shook her head.

“All they said was work accident.” her gaze grew angry. “Those Fazbear Entertainment sons of…” she stopped and calmed herself down.

“I need to know.” So Jeremy told her, from start to finish. About his support and help from the beginning, to his sacrifice for Jeremy at the end. When he got to the part where he was holding Chase before he died, he paused.

“He wanted you to know something.” Abby cocked her head, “What is it?”

“He said…tell my Abby that the code is 9...18...27. It’ll have everything they need.” He looked up at her and her eyes widened.

“The safe.” She whispered, she was about to go before Jeremy stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

“There was one other thing he said...he said you were the last star.” She turned to Jeremy, tears sparkling in her eyes, and hugged him. He hesitantly hugged her back while she cried.

Jeremy sat in the chair at the cemetery, chin on his hand. They had opened the safe before lowering Chase’s coffin into the grave. Inside was hundreds of copper pennies and a note saying he had put one in every time he said I love you to his wife and daughters. So that when he was gone, they’d still have all the love he had given them. ‘You better not spend it all on candy for the girls. I know Angelina has a sweet tooth.’ He had jokingly added at the end. As well in the safe was a painting he had done. It was a gorgeous view of a hill where a man and woman, presumably Chase and Abby, were sitting and holding hands. A ring was clearly visible and shining on the woman’s finger, it shone brighter than the stars in the sky. Chase had painted it himself and named it, ‘The Last Star’. Abby explained that on the night that he proposed to her, they had counted the stars. He told her there was one more star that she wasn’t counting, but he didn’t explain why. Jeremy had shed several tears during it all. He had heard so many stories from Chase’s friends and family. One man who was an old coworker with Chase, tall with black hair, told a really touching story about how Chase had come to him when he was at his worst and had given up and made him realize what purpose he had left. Jeremy was continually astounded at how much he didn’t know about Chase. After the burial, Jeremy lingered around for a bit hoping to hear more stories about Chase. Instead he was approached by Henry, the man from the restaurcade.

“What are you doing here?” Jeremy asked confused.

“It’s time I told you who I am Jeremy Fitzgerald.” Henry stretched his hand out.

“I’m the creator of the animatronics. I’m...I was the original owner of Fazbear Entertainment. Back then it was Fazbear Family Fun, but regardless. I need your help.” The tall man from before walked over.

“You wanted to talk to me?” The man said. Henry nodded, “Yes I do. Jeremy...meet Mikeal. Mikeal meet Jeremy. Get comfortable with each other, you’ll be working together for the next while.”

The officer parked the car in front of the apartment building and got out, hand on her taser. The rain soaked through her uniform and she reached back in the car to grab her poncho. When she turned back around, she saw a teenage boy holding the hand of a young girl walking down the steps of the building's fire escape.

“Are you Jeremy? Jeremy Fitzgerald?” She shouted. The boy raised his head and nodded, “Yea. I’ll be with you in a second.” He said and led his younger sister up the steps and into the house, where their mother presumably ushered her inside. She tried to bring Jeremy inside but he pointed to the police officer waiting by the cruiser. She nodded and went with him, “Hello Officer. I’m Julia Fitzgerald” She greeted when she got close.

“Good morning Miss Fitzgerald. Are you the one who called 911?” She asked. The woman nodded.

“Alright, you reported some sort of...animal? That was chasing your boy?” Julia hesitated.   
“Yes.” The officer squinted at her obvious lie. “Mmhmm. Is there anybody else in the family other than you and these two?” Julia shook her head. “No, just us thr-“ there was a faint clatter from nearby, the officer placed her hand on her taser. Then approached where she thought the sound had come from. On the dirt were long divots, like something had been dragged and repeatedly dropped. She frowned and looked out at the sage brush landscape. There wasn’t anything out there, some sort of dead animal maybe, but that was it. The officer shook her head and returned to the family.

“Well I found tracks, whatever it was managed to get away. Make sure to lock your door and windows tonight just in case.” Jeremy seemed to go pale when he heard that.

“You okay kid? You’re pale as a sheet?”

“Oh you better not be getting a cold. Get inside.” Julia waved Jeremy inside and turned to the officer.

“You didn’t see anything out there?” Julia asked one more time, despite knowing the answer.

“Like a...puppet or something?” Julia winced at how weird it sounded. The officer frowned, “No, nothing of the sort.” Julia nodded with a grimace on her face.

“Of course. Have a good night officer.” Julia said and turned to go inside her apartment. Unaware of the burning red eyes of the Marionette watching them from a long distance away.


	33. Chapter 33

Once again, you become aware in a field of white, mist curled in the air as a figure approached a desk. The figure approached the old desk, sitting down on the chair. He immediately yelped and stood up. Glaring down at the chair, he checked it for any more splinters, then cautiously sat.

”Cheap asshole.” He muttered, then cleared his throat and gathered together the sheets of paper scattered all over the desk. Some were slightly wet, as if tear stained, the Narrator picked these up carefully and organized them neatly in a folder labeled, ‘LFVNGD’.

”So, A life was avenged, just not the one you were expecting huh? I’ll admit I was caught off guard as well.” He said smiling gently and slipping the folder into a drawer. He pulled out one more and set it on the desk. This was was labeled, ‘LFTWSTD’.

”Another one is well on the way, KillCode is taking a break for the holidays. But the next story is well on the way. With a new proofreader hired as well. Not exactly hired since KillCode isn’t paying them nor me, but that aside expect the quality of the story-.” He caught himself, then cleared his throat again.

”Expect the quality of the _grammer_ to increase. No promises on the actual plot. Anyways, my part is done. Until next time.” The Narrator stood, walking away and leaving the folder on the desk. You reach out and open it, the first few pages have handwriting that’s too messy to figure out. But one phrase is clear...

Why does it say skinny penis?


End file.
